Gimme Three Steps (Toward Success)

I grew up with a friend who made a fortune twice. And unlike other people who have done this, he didn't go broke after his first fortune and then earn another fortune. Instead, he started a successful business, sold it, and after a time he became bored doing not much of anything, so he started another very successful company. I was thinking about him this morning because I remembered something he shared with me about himself.

When I went to visit him in California after he started his second business, Blaze Pizza, he took me to his first restaurant in the chain. While we were sampling the food and service, I complimented him on his success.

"I'm really proud of you," I said. "You've worked hard to make yourself a success."

"Actually," he corrected me, "I don't like to work hard at all." He told me that he takes a very leisurely approach to business and spends very little time in his office.

That goes completely counter to everything I thought I knew about success, leaving me to wonder what really is the combination to unlock it. I don't claim to know all of the digits, but I think I have at least three of them.

1. Great ideas are a dime a dozen. Sure, my friend had at least two great ideas. The first was triggered by a childhood memory. When we were in grade school, one of the kids in our class used to tease him about his last name. He called him Wetzel the Pretzel. Years later, when he was searching for ideas to start a franchise, he remembered that and so he started the Wetzel Pretzel chain. But clearly, a great idea is not the only requirement for financial success or most people I know would be fabulously wealthy. I once had a friend who claimed to have come up with the idea of using a vacuum cleaner hose to drive a motor with a blade that you could use to cut your hair. Only later was the Flowbee vacuum cleaner attachment for cutting hair patented. But it wasn't my buddy who patented it and reaped the financial benefits. Clearly there's more to financial success than just having a great idea. You have to take action.

2. Risk has rewards. Once my grade school friend had an idea for a pretzel franchise, he risked his time and money to start the business. Had he not taken that leap of faith, he would never have made a go of it. But I think there's at least one other ingredient in his recipe for success.

3. Location, location, location. Corpus Christi, Texas is a great place to be from, but it's not the land of financial opportunity. It's a sleepy little seaside city where we grew up, but had his family not left when he was in high school, I doubt he would have succeeded in business. He ended up in the Los Angeles area, which is where he started his first (and second) business(es) and where there is ample opportunity for success in a variety of fields. That's not the only place where his franchises could have succeeded but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have happened in south Texas.

Whether you want to succeed in the restaurant business or in live event production, I think you need more than a great idea. You need to act on your ideas. It helps to have a tolerance for calculated risk, and be willing to relocate to where the opportunities are. Just ask Rick Wetzel.