The Owner: Terry Jarvis, 59 years old.
The Business: Sunlawn Inc., Distributor of hand-powered lawnmowers based in Fort Collins, Colo.
The Story: Terry Jarvis describes his hand-powered lawnmower business as a hobby turned obsession turned enterprise. While that's not an uncommon route to home-based entrepreneurship, the circumstances behind Sunlawn are unusual in that two employees -- Mr. Jarvis' wife Sandra, 53, and daughter Elisa, 30 -- also work out of the home and headquarters.
Mr. Jarvis told Working From Home how he started and runs a business with employees based at his residence:
A constant source of annoyance for me on weekends was the hours-long droning of power mowers, leaf blowers and other outdoor power equipment, including my own power mower. I remembered the heavy, clunky hand mowers I used when I was young and I reasoned that hand mowers were by now bound to be lighter and less clunky. I bought one and found out that it was the same design, a bit lighter, and did a good job of mowing so I used it for the rest of the season.
After one season's use I pondered whether there were better hand mowers available and by spring I had purchased five or six to try. One impressed me as light, quiet, easy to push and easy to maintain. My wife, Sandra, gave it a try and within three weeks we were having discussions about how much fun it was to mow and who would get to do it.
At that point the business opportunity occurred to me. There were few vendors; reel mowers were barely visible in the U.S. market. I researched the market for a year and in 1997 my idea of importing and selling reel mowers became Sunlawn. The company grew well from the start. We found the Internet to be a superior way to sell our products. In 2002, Sunlawn experienced a growth spurt that brought on the necessity of hiring additional help, so Sandra came to work for the business.
We had discussed working together for at least a year and she had followed the company's progress closely so the change occurred with harmony. But, as growth increased, evening discussions became common, causing too much crossover between family and business time. Growth also caused a paper spillover out of the home-office area and into the dining room. Separation of home and family became a problem.
Happily, we moved to another house that had a finished, detached garage. We found that when the paperwork was out of the living area we were much more able to separate business from family issues and business time from family time. The detached office building has become a valuable asset.
Now Sandra and one other employee -- my youngest daughter who commutes from 20 miles away -- work in the office. Our long driveway and front area allows for sufficient parking since we do get visitors at the office. I don't have any space in the office because I travel a great deal. My laptop and an area in the house are sufficient for me. A wireless network allows me to sit outside on the patio.
Our warehouse, advertising and logistics groups are all in different cities. The accounting group is local and manufacturing is all overseas. The office in the garage serves mostly as the order processing, customer service and communications center.
While our space is fine for now, my wife says we'll have to move to a different facility in about two years, when we expect to hire someone who isn't part of the family.
-- Mr. Henricks, an Austin, Texas, journalist, is the author of "Not Just a Living: The Complete Guide to Creating a Business That Gives You a Life" (Perseus Books, 2002).
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