From left: Justin Aronstein, Michelle Zippelli, Will Vinton, Marcelo Altamiranda and Dan Dietz of Olejo Inc.
Starting up with time on their side
Is now as good a time as any?
Despite, and in many cases, because of the down economy, start-ups are growing.
“People have lost their jobs, had to search for additional work or new
work and they haven’t been able to find it because of the recession,”
said Allio, who estimates a 20 percent increase in necessity driven
start-ups.
“If you can start at a low point, your business plan is probably ... strong,” said Devin Cole, ONEin3 Boston manager. metro
Starting a business isn’t easy these days, but maybe that’s why entrepreneurs fresh out of school are taking the gutsy first step.
“Generally speaking, young people have a lot more appetite and tolerance for the risk associated with a new venture,” said Mark Allio, regional director for the Massachusetts Small Business Development Center Network.
Allio estimates that a new entrepreneur has a 50 percent chance of lasting longer than four years.
“I took a huge risk, but it’s a fun risk,” said Dan Dietz, 22. Dietz created Olejo Incorporated, a database design company for e-commerce Web sites, with Justin Aronstein in the spring of 2008. “If you have an understanding and a vision and you enjoy what you’re doing, it limits the fear.”
Michel Lutfi, 25, co-owner of Temptations Café, finds delegation a necessity to his family’s business, which was started in 2001 in Brookline and expanded in 2006 to a second location on Huntington Avenue. Michel and his brothers — Lou, 28, and Nassib, 23 — run the two different locations while their mother and father do the behind the scenes work such as daily food preparation and paperwork.
“It was a big risk and a lot of hard work,” said Lutfi.