THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, May 18, 1995 TAG: 9505180697
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TOM SHEAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 70 lines
After listening to the owner of a Pittsburgh consulting firm describe her efforts to expand the small business, George Gendron half-jokingly suggested that she keep a diary.
Anita F. Brattina, the firm's owner, acted on his suggestion. She even sent part of her diary to Gendron, who turned it into a cover story for Inc. magazine in early 1993.
``It was a day-to-day account of all the things that got in the way of her grandiose plans,'' said Gendron, Inc.'s editor-in-chief.
Brattina's journal captures the frustrations that many small-business owners encounter when trying to build up their companies.
In an Inc. story, ``we don't want to give the illusion that it's easy'' to run a small business, Gendron said. ``It's not as glamorous as a lot of people would like to think it is.''
Inc. will open a three-day conference in Norfolk this morning for the heads of companies on its latest list of the 500 fastest-growing private companies in the country.
The conference, which is being held at Norfolk's Waterside Convention Center, is expected to draw 1,200 people. The conference has become a major annual event forthe magazine and the audience it serves.
The idea of publishing a magazine for small-business owners and managers sprang from the difficulties that Inc.'s founder and chairman, Bernard A. Goldhirsh, faced in 1969.
Goldhirsh, who had studied physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was trying to expand a sailing newsletter into a monthly magazine that he dubbed Sail. However, ``there was nothing in his educational background that prepared him for running a business,'' Gendron said.
In the process of negotiating with bankers and signing contracts with printers, Goldhirsh decided other entrepreneurs might need information about compiling financial statements and applying to banks for a line of credit.
Inc.'s first issue came out in April 1979. Two years later, the magazine compiled a list of the 100 fastest-growing private companies, something that it expanded to 500 companies in 1982.
Fortune magazine, whose stories concentrate on developments in corporate America, was already well known for ranking the nation's 500 largest industrial companies and 500 largest service companies. However, Fortune's lists ``suggested that the only companies that mattered were big, publicly traded companies,'' Gendron said.
Inc. decided to publish a list that would draw attention to those rapidly expanding companies that might appear on Fortune's list a decade from now.
Among the companies that have made the leap are Microsoft Corp. But many on Inc.'s annual 500 lists eventually are acquired by larger companies. Others on the list falter, and a few die.
The magazine's staff has been tracking down each of the companies that appeared on the Inc. 500 list in 1985, and an article scheduled for the November issue will describe what happened to them.
Today, Inc.'s circulation is approaching 650,000, and Gendron is thinking about future readers. Massive employee cutbacks at large American corporations have prompted more people to consider launching a business of their own, the Inc. editor-in-chief said.
Scores of giant companies, he noted, are laying off employees even as they chalk up record profits. ``The traditional job security that we assumed we had when we got out of college is gone,'' said Gendron.
``This is the defining issue of our time'' - and one that Gendron is betting will bring additional readers to Inc. by CNB