The Fighting Entrepreneur

After giving you my abbreviated history the last couple weeks, I thought you might also be interested in a little battle I had with the US government. This article tells the story. It is from February 1997 and was printed in the Salt Lake Tribune.

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Best-Selling Author Wins in Court

The Federal Trade Commission has lost still another round in its fight with Utah businessman Mark O. Haroldsen, author of the best-selling How to Wake up the Financial Genius inside You.

US District Judge David Sam has dismissed the FTC lawsuit against Haroldsen’s FreeCom Communications and other defendants in the case. Sam ruled the government failed to allege in its lawsuit exactly how Haroldsen’s company defrauded anyone.

Last June, the judge turned down an FTC request to freeze the assets of Haroldsen’s companies. He also refused to appoint a receiver to take over the business operations.

“The FTC uses intimidation to cause businesses to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to defend themselves against ridiculous allegations,” Haroldsen says. “I hope the FTC realizes they have lost and move on.”

The FTC, and a joint effort with the Utah Attorney General’s office, filed its complaint in Utah federal court in June 1996. It contended Haroldsen, three other individuals and six related companies made unfounded claims at seminars and in television “infomercials” to persuade people to buy $495 starter kits to help them launch home businesses.

The government contended that few if any consumers actually earned substantial income from the business ventures FreeCom detailed — ventures that included the resale of distressed merchandise, the operation of vending machines and the sale of vitamins and color-change T-shirts.

Shortly after the government filed its lawsuit, Haroldsen’s attorney Richard Casey responded that company records indicated customers’ complaints were low, less than a fraction of 1 percent.

Haroldsen’s hope that he will be able to go on with business without the cloud of an FTC lawsuit may not be realized.

Although he dismissed the lawsuit, the judge gave the FTC permission to file an amended complaint within 30 days.

“This is a setback, but we are not too concerned about it,” says Jeff Gray of the Utah Attorney General’s office, which has been working with the FTC.

— Written for the Salt Lake Tribune by Stephen Oberbeck

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That happened in 1997 but the FTC continued to file suit and, essentially, harass us until July 2001 when the court again found that “the FTC utterly failed to introduce sufficient probative evidence in support of its allegations.” In the end, we sued them for attorneys fees and won.

This whole experience is kind of a lesson in being an entrepreneur who thinks differently than everyone else. When you try something new, and especially when you’re successful at it, people might question what you’re doing. But if you believe in what you’re doing, if you’re offering a useful product or service and are helping people along the way, there’s no reason for you to question it yourself. Believe in what you do, and I think you’ll always come out on top.

Big Time Persistence

One of the best kept secrets to big time success is focus, focus, focus. And persistence. These apply to so many things, especially wealth and health. If you do a lot of thinking on the things you want to do in life, whether it’s a huge goal or small, whether you want it to happen in the next hour or month or year, it is super critical for you to take time to think it through, do some planning, set goals, and put it on a time schedule. Do this and you may be big time surprised at how much you can get done.

There are certain things you can do that can almost guarantee your success if you stay on track, focus, and are persistent. In addition to writing your goals and dreams down, read, read, read articles, books and anything else that tells you about the success of others that wanted to do what you want to accomplish. Reading their stories should motivate you to get going and go after your goals.

Next, go out of your way to meet those people that have done what you want to do. Just be persistent, and when you meet them, pick the brains of those super successful people. I’ve done this with so many of my goals and it really works.

Okay, it’s not easy to do all this but persistence is one of the keys to making this happen so keep up that persistence. You can start with friends and family who have been successful. Once you’ve picked their brains and discovered how useful it is, this should supercharge you to go out and find others. 

So head out and find the people that have done the kinds of things you want to be doing. You will discover that there are some super successful people who love to coach and will give great advice on how they made it big. Maybe you can even get them to make you a list of what worked for them. Most super successful  people love to coach and be a mentor for other people who are really sincere about doing what they did.
For next week’s blog post, I want to share with you my story about all the many things and people that helped me big time, and I want to do the same for you!

Lessons from Ukraine

Like many of you, this war in Ukraine has been weighing very heavily on my mind. It just seems so stupid and pointless. It has gotten me thinking about my visit to that beautiful country in 2011. Back then, we spent a very pleasurable couple of days in Kiev, Ukraine’s capital and one of the oldest cities in Eastern Europe. The city has been on a crazy roller coaster throughout its history. It’s gone from great prosperity and prominence to near obscurity and everything in between. And although the Russians aren’t at the capital, and hopefully will never get there in this crazy war, the spirit of that city represents the whole country, a place that we can all learn from as we hope and pray for an end to this awful fighting.

It was thought that Kiev was a commercial center of Eastern Europe as early as the 5th century, being on the route between Scandinavia and Constantinople. In the 9th century, the city was seized by Vikings, then it was demolished by Mongols in the mid-13th century. The city made a comeback during the Russian Empire’s Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s, going on to eventually be chosen as the capital of the newly formed Ukrainian National Republic in 1917. It weathered the sweeping communist reforms of the early 20th century only to be greatly damaged in World War II. Even so, it recovered to become the 3rd largest city of the Soviet Union. Half a century later, Ukraine claimed its independence and Kiev, again, became the capital of a richly fertile, if still financially struggling, land.

For all its hardships, including the one it’s dealing with right now, the country is historically resilient and strong. It has had huge challenges and, sometimes, great defeats. But being knocked down has only been a temporary state for this country and its capital city. It keeps getting back up and keeps moving forward.

If this place, which has been invaded, demolished, controlled by its neighbors, and beaten-up multiple times can recover to claim and reclaim its prominent position after all it’s been through, we can hold on to tremendous hope for the Ukrainian people, and for ourselves, because they represent the possibilities for us all.

So, next time you are facing a huge challenge or defeat, consider how much the country of Ukraine has been through and how the people there are persevering and even pushing back the much bigger country of Russia. If Ukraine and its beautiful capital can do that with all they have been up against, there is no reason why we as individuals can’t weather our challenges and fully recover from our own losses and defeats as well, if not come back better than ever.  

Biden’s Hard Work

Last November I wrote my blog about meeting Joe Biden at a house of a friend of mine. I was so very impressed by how intelligent he was. He was also such a nice down to earth guy.

So, yes, I was very delighted that he won the election and is now our president. I’m confident that he will be great for our wonderful nation. And now, of course, I will be showing off the picture of the two of us that I put in my previous November 15th post. I’m sure he loves the picture and he’ll never forget me… ho ho ho.

But, yes, I will put the picture of Biden and I on my home office wall along with the many other famous people I’ve had by my side. And, yes, I still have the big sign above all those photographs that reads, “People Who Don’t Know Me”.

But all joking aside, this past week has brought to mind my deep appreciation for the country that I live in. I’ve traveled the world and visited more than 90 countries and even lived in the middle eastern country of Turkey for a time. I’ll never forget being awakened by gun fire and explosions near our apartment when I lived in Turkey. I ran to the balcony and looked out at hundreds of soldiers and their guns. We were right then living in the middle of a military revolution and a chaotic overthrow of the government. It was quite the experience.

What I have seen in Turkey and elsewhere has helped me realize how proud, pleased, free, and safe I have been living in this great country called America. I am quite confident that the next 4 years will make us an even better country and place to live.

I do have confidence that President Biden will be instrumental in bringing Americans closer together, regardless of our political differences, education, or wealth. I’ve been reading a bit about Joe’s background and it doesn’t surprise me that he has done so much in his life.

Biden is a very hard worker, so much so that in high school he was the star of the football team and led his team to a perfect undefeated season, making many, many touchdowns himself. If you want to be one of the best in almost any field, it takes lots and lots of hard work and time.

I know this from my own personal experiences, both in business and sports. When I was in high school, I set a goal to be a great basketball player and spent 4 to 5 hours a day practicing. My biggest specific goal was to help my small American high school in Ankara, Turkey win the big American basketball tournament in Rome, Italy. And, yes, we did win the tourney and I went on to get a basketball scholarship at Utah State University. That was the good news. The bad news was that I mostly sat on the bench there. Oh, well. I hit my goal of being on the team at least.

Joe Biden certainly knows and applies those ideas. He takes lots and lots of time and puts in a ton of hard work. He’s done it big time now as the President of the United State of America.

 

Success is Measured by Obstacles

The famous Booker T. Washington once said, “Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome.”  Darcy Andries, author of The Secret of Success is Not a Secret, certainly underscores that comment in terms of the obstacles that have often proceeded the rise of so very many famous and successful people. Her book lists more than 250 super successful people who persevered through huge setbacks and failures to become big-time successes.

Take Rowland Hussey Macy, who tried and failed many times before he found success. He tried to start and operate a needle and thread store in Boston, and later a store that sold European-made dry goods. He failed both times. Then, after an unsuccessful store in Marysville, California, opened with his brother during the 1849 goldrush, he returned to the East Coast to open another dry goods store in a town north of Boston, an endeavor that eventually forced him into bankruptcy. He then moved to New York City and opened yet another store which ended disastrously when it was robbed and then burned down. Ugh.

Most people, I think, would have given up at that point but not Rowland Macy. He rebuilt, opening a little fancy dry goods store at 14^th Street and 6^th Avenue in New York City, north of the city’s other dry goods stores, called R. H. Macy & Co. After initial encouraging sales, he expanded, eventually occupying 11 adjacent buildings, each selling different categories of merchandise and effectively launching what we now call a department store.

By the 1870’s Macy’s store was averaging more than $1 million in annual sales and it has grown ever since. Now known simply as Macy’s, would you believe that little shop has grown into more than 850 stores and has gross sales in the double-digit billions?

I don’t know about you or your significant other, but my wife certainly helps Macy’s stay in business and thrive. I don’t know whether to thank Rowland Macy or complain! Unfortunately, I can’t do either since he checked out of life in 1877 at the young age of 55. But I’ve got to hand it to him – with all those setbacks spanning a period of nearly 14 years, he kept at it anyways and, I think most people would admit, he did okay for himself in the end.

 

Try, Try Again

My beautiful wife, Kimberly, gave me a great book not too long ago. I read it and set it aside but then couldn’t find it, until last week. Yay! The book, by Darcy Andries, is entitled The Secret of Success…It’s Not a Secret.  The book gives the details of the struggles, the setbacks, the failures, and the great losses that many eventually successful and now famous people had. Elvis Presley, Billy Crystal, Michael J. Fox, John Grisham, Tennessee Williams, Colonel Sanders, Andrew Carnegie, Al Pacino, Oprah Winfrey, Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Bob Cousy, Sylvester Stallone, and Robin Williams are just a few of the names from the list Andries gives of over 200 people who were initially rejected and pushed aside, only to come back strong and become super successful.

One name from that big list of super successful people is a guy I know by the name of Richard Paul Evans. He wrote the immensely successful book, The Christmas Box, which sold over 7 million copies. What is so fascinating about Richard’s beginning as an author is that it’s so similar to mine. We both got rejected and turned down by many, many book publishers. Nobody seemed to care or be interested in our books at all.

Both Richard and I did the same thing after all those rejections. We both went to print shops and paid to have our book printed. I printed 1,000 copies of my book and began selling and giving them away. Richard, however, really out did me on that one. He eventually printed 700,000 books – although not all at once – and sold them over time.

The big news was that after we had our own publishing successes, we each had big time New York publishers contact us, eventually getting contracts with them to print and distribute our books to bookstores. Richard’s publisher actually paid $4.2 million for the rights to his book. No, my book deals were not that profitable, but I must say, selling all those books myself did lead me to doing seminars and publishing a newsletter which itself became a huge part of the fortune that I’ve been so blessed to have amassed.

It is so amazing that so very many big time famous names and people had huge struggles when they started but they stuck to the old proverb, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.” I would add that if you keep trying, and never give up, you will most likely end up with your big dreams coming true.

I think, in the next few weeks, I will share with you some of the stories of these famous people who had big time failures but went on to have super successful lives, people who dug themselves out of a deep hole because they never gave up.