The Venture Edge

Dal LaMagna is a serial entrepreneur who experienced business failure after business failure before, through the power of perseverance -- and a great idea -- he started a venture that made him rich. First there was the time when he took a year off Harvard Business School in the late-'60s to try to make his fortune by converting two drive-in movie theaters into drive-in discos. They flopped. Then there was the square "LaMagna Lasagna Pan," designed to exactly fit a standard-size lasagna noodle. It bombed. And his decision to produce a horror flick about the inmates of an insane asylum taking over the local town? A nonstarter.

But what finally did stick was Dal's idea for a high-quality set of $15 tweezers, sold through beauty stores. 

A couple weeks ago I ran a guest post -- 8 Tips for Finding Angel Investors -- written by Arnie Koss who, with his twin brother Ron, started the country's first organic baby food manufacturer: Earth's Best Baby Food. The post was a big hit on the Internet, being tweeted and re-tweeted to more than 30,000 people in less than a week's time. This time I've got a guest post written by Ron Koss on the topic of How to Overcome Start-Up Fears. This is something that every entrepreneur has gone through at one time or another in their careers, and it can be a serious roadblock to your success. You'll find a lot more great advice to entrepreneurs -- including obtaining start-up and growth funding, and dealing with angel investors -- in his new book: The Earth's Best Story: A Bittersweet Tale of Twin Brothers Who Sparked an Organic Revolution (Chelsea Green Publishing, March 2010).