Fundamentals of Management, 8th ed

Business Closures 

Business Start-ups

Year

F I G U R E 5 . 5

Business Start-Up Successes and Failures

Over the most recent ten-year period for which data are available, new business start-ups numbered

between 700,000 and 900,000 per year. Business failures during this same period, meanwhile, ranged from

about 600,000 to 950,000 per year.

Source: http://www.bls.gov/bdm/entrepreneurship/bdm_chart5.htm, accessed on March 2014.

Chapter 5: Entrepreneurship and New Venture Management

1 4 9

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very existence to the Internet. At the same time, however, many would-be Internet entre-

preneurs have gone under in the last few years, as the so-called dot-com boom quickly

faded. In 2010, online retail sales exceeded $142 billion, an increase of 3 percent from the

previous year.

Indeed, it seems as if new ideas emerge virtually every day. Andrew Beebe, for

example, is scoring big with Bigstep, a web business that essentially creates, hosts, and

maintains websites for other small businesses. So far, Bigstep has signed up 75,000

small-business clients. Beebe actually provides his basic services for free but earns

money by charging for the so-called premium services such as customer billing. Karl

Jacob’s Keen.com is a web business that matches people looking for advice with experts

who have the answers. Keen got the idea when he and his father were struggling to fix a

boat motor and did not know where to turn for help. Keen.com attracted 100,000

subscribers in just three months.

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