Occasionally we receive a call or email from a large chain restaurant or a large hotel. They are interested in Schedulefly, yet need more than we offer. They like what we do – they just need more. I’d guess that most small businesses in our position would jump all over these opportunities – they would add more – and try to get the business and grow faster. In fact, early on – we did that once – only to see the customer eventually leave anyway. In hindsight, we were never going to be right – and I’m thankful they decided to move on. Who knows what path our software would have taken had we kept adding more stuff specific to their big corporate needs.

Today, we no longer do that. Here are 3 reasons why:

1. We love being small. 5 people running our business makes us pleasant to do business with and it also makes running our business easier.
2. We love doing business with small businesses. It’s fun. The owners are polite and fun and need simple tools. They are often just like us.
3. There is a big market of independent restaurants and small groups that need simple tools – that’s never going to change. It’s a giant opportunity for a company with a focus and little overhead.

A few days ago a large hotel chain called Wil and quickly started asking about stuff we don’t do. They wanted more. They even said “this could be a big account for you if you add what we need” – speaking to him kind of like Darth Vader spoke to Luke Skywalker – hoping to lure him to the dark side. Wil quickly and politely said no thank you and recommended they check out another company that does what we do – in addition to tons of other stuff. They would be perfect – they already have what that hotel wants and the more large accounts the “competition” brings on – the more people they need to hire and the harder it will be for them to serve those just right for us. Meanwhile – that same day – 10-15 restaurants signed up to check us out – restaurants who are just right.

Wes