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As we celebrate the one year anniversary of Small Town Rules and winning a 2013 Small Business Book Award, we’ve asked a few friends to share the rules that are a part of their business every day. Andy Hayes used this idea to talk about the difference between a complex business and a sophisticated business,…

As we celebrate the one year anniversary of Small Town Rules and winning a 2013 Small Business Book Award, we’ve asked a few friends to share the rules that are a part of their business every day. Today, Heidi Thorne shares two examples from her business: “The most important Small Town Rules for me have…

Fairfield Inn, a Marriott brand, is promoting its small town cool roots. This sign from the lobby of the Fairfield Inn in Hutchinson, Kansas, lays out the rural connection, right down to the horseback photo and cowboy hat. “Fairfield Farm was J. Willard Marriott’s favorite vacation home, known for the warm welcome it provided to…

My friend Rob Zazueta shares a weekly newsletter that he describes as Fascinating. You never know what topics he’ll tackle. When I read this story about Sam Adams, it was such a perfect fit for Small Town Rules, I just had to share it. –Becky  Beer Me To know me is to know I love…

Two big awards for Small Town Rules 1. Named one of the Best Small Business Books Published in 2012 by the National Federation of Independent Business. 2. Named a Winner in the 2013 Small Business Book Awards: Cleveland, OH, April 2, 2013 – Small Town Rules has been named a Winner in the 2013 Small Business…

We’re all living with a changed economy and new rules for how we do business. The major themes in Small Town Rules are recognized by many other authors, including Gary Vaynerchuk and Tony Hseih. To round out your reading on these new rules, we’ve put together an Amazon list of complementary books: Doing business in…

We’ve been hitting the airwaves with Small Town Rules. Here are a couple of recent radio shows. Author and small business expert Barbara Weltman featured Becky on Build Your Business Radio (WSRadio.com): Build Your Business Radio Interview   Brian Sullivan and Pat Madden featured Becky on The Entrepreneurial Moment radio show (KCTE in the Kansas City…

The rise of containerized shipping and intermodals has completely remade the shipping industry, and it serves as a model for the change in the entire economy. The New York Times profiled the changes to jobs at New York area ports, in On the Waterfront, the Rise of the Machines. The old way of distributing work…

Big-box stores are getting smaller. Because so many big box retail chains are cutting back on store sizes, Barry Shlachter writes in the Fort Worth Star Telegram that this is a national trend. It’s also one of the Small Town Rules, where we know that bigger isn’t always better. A few juicy quotes from the…

James Lowe interviewed Becky for his Talk Radio X show. We talked about where the concept came from, the process of writing when we were based in different towns, and about connecting customer service to culture and place.

Author Barry Moltz took time to join J.J. Ramberg on MSNBC. They talk about a few of the rules, and how J.J. has seen the trend towards thinking and acting small in business.

Early in the book, Small Town Rules, we mistakenly say: “Events that “stick” to a large corporation can threaten to bring down a company. There are well known examples of Johnson and Johnson’s Tylenol (product tampering), Perrier (product contamination) and Honda (brake failures).” One loyal reader rightfully pointed out that the brake issue was at Toyota not…