All of this added up to a scenario where I’ve genuinely changed my physical health over the last 18 months. I’ve developed some skill in jiu-jitsu, gone down a couple of sizes, and probably shifted my body composition quite a bit.

These changes are still a little startling to me, because in the past I found it very hard to make fitness changes stick. And I realized that if someone asked me how I’d done it, I would have to answer honestly: train jiu-jitsu two to three hours a day, five days a week; lift weights twice a week; and reorient your nutrition toward athletic performance rather than “regular eating.” Then sustain that for a year or more.

Which is funny, because I’m sure that sounds laughably obvious. It’s the opposite of a life hack. Tips and tricks are supposed to take something hard and make it easy. They create that little “wow” moment—I can’t believe you got those results by doing just this one small thing. Like if it turned out I’d improved my fitness simply by switching one meal a day to lemon Jell-O. Incredible. Anyone could do it.

But in my case, I took something hard and—somewhat unintentionally—tackled it with enough intensity that there simply wasn’t a way things wouldn’t shift over time. If I describe it out loud, it sounds obvious to the point of being almost embarrassing. If someone asked me how I changed my fitness and I answered honestly, they’d probably say, “Well yeah, obviously that would work.” Thirteen to eighteen hours of high-intensity exercise and/or targeted physical preparation per week is not a fitness hack.

Which got me thinking.

There is probably something you want to see change in your life or your business. What if you approached it in a way that, 18 months from now, when you got exactly the results you wanted, your approach would feel like a laughably obvious outcome of the work you put in? What if you did the thing that would make someone say, “Well yeah, obviously that would work.”

Naomi Dunford of Itty Biz has a framework that captures this from a different angle. She asks: for the goal you have, what would it look like to try really hard? And she clarifies that trying only counts if it happens “in the place in time and space where the trying makes a difference… You have to be able to replay the tape of the day and point to the footage of yourself actually doing the trying.”

I think that’s ultimately what worked for me with jiu-jitsu. Because I came to it backward—I hadn’t even intended to start—and because the fitness wasn’t about shrinking myself but about injury-proofing my body to do a sport I fell in love with, all of the effort went into actually doing the doing. Not planning. Not optimizing. Not feeling bad about falling short. Just showing up and training.

And if you’re not willing to do that for the thing you say you want—why? Is it because you don’t actually care enough about the outcome to put in that level of work? Is it because the work itself would make you miserable? Is it because you’re not willing or able to restructure other parts of your life to allow that intensity? Those are all completely valid answers. But if you’re pretty clear on what would be required to get the outcome you want—and you’re not willing or able to do that—why are you still holding onto the goal?

It’s true that sometimes the right approach is small steps. Sometimes “just the next right thing” or the tiniest possible movement forward is exactly what’s needed. I’m generally moderate in all things. Especially in a culture that glorifies hustle and endless escalation. Especially when burnout is real, when many of us are caring for other people, dealing with physical limitations or chronic illness, and trying to pay the bills.

But I’m not actually advocating for doing more. I’m advocating for doing what’s required—if the thing truly matters. And if it doesn’t matter enough to do what’s required, why is it taking up space in our already limited hearts, minds, and schedules?

I also think there’s a kind of freedom that comes from not holding back. I remember being on the high school basketball team and finding practices absolutely exhausting. I tried to conserve energy, to find the easier path through them. But I eventually noticed that looking for ways to hold back took more effort than just showing up and throwing my full energy, attention, and physical effort into the two hours of practice. Somehow, it was easier to really try than to half-try.

Poet David Whyte points at something similar when he writes, “The antidote to exhaustion is not necessarily rest. The antidote to exhaustion is wholeheartedness.” I think our emphasis on boundaries, self-care, moderation, and pacing is deeply important. But sometimes what actually drains us is not effort—it’s the friction of holding back, of wanting something while never fully committing to the work that would make it real.

So here’s a suggestion. For the thing you most want to shift in your life or business, what would obviously work, if you actually tackled it that way? You don’t have to do it. Just imagine it. And then imagine how it would feel to move through your days with that level of commitment. Would it feel exhausting—or would it feel oddly clarifying? Even relieving?

Either way, I think you deserve the wholeheartedness of choosing. Of setting down the half-measures, even if that means setting down the goal altogether.

• Believe there isn’t a hard part if you pick the right business

• Think that if there is a hard part, they’ll just hire someone to do it

• Incorrectly identify what the hard part of that business will actually be

Let’s take these one at a time, spending the most time on the last one.

First: if you think your startup idea—or your buddy Frank’s business—doesn’t have a hard part, you’re wrong. Or you’re basically talking about a hobby. Every real business has a hard part. That’s where the profit comes from.

Second: you might think you can hire someone to do the hard part. You can’t. The hard part of the business is always the thing the business owner has to manage and be obsessed with, or it simply won’t happen at the level of excellence it requires. The hard part is the important part, and the business owner must be in charge of the important part.

This doesn’t mean you can’t hire people to help you execute. You can. But they will never own the hard part the way you will.

These are simple truths you have to accept. But the third piece—correctly identifying what the hard part actually is—takes more skill.

This is a big problem, because the hard part of a business is the part that:

1. If done right, makes the business successful and competitive

2. If done poorly, shuts the business down

3. You’ll spend the most time on, worry about the most, and need to become an expert in

(So if you want to live a decent life while running a business, you should make sure the hard part is something you’re willing to spend your days on.)

The businesses most destined for failure are the ones that spend most or all of their time—both at startup and day to day—on the easy parts instead of the hard parts.

Common businesses and their hard parts

Pizza shop with a good location

Almost every day, I drive past 440 Pizzeria, a little pizza shop on Broadway, right across from the high school. During after-school hours, it’s standing room only—teenagers jammed into the shop, clambering to hand over their money. You might see that and think the owner has it made.

But if you’re running a pizza shop with a great location, the easy parts are making pizza and getting customers. The hard part is keeping the lights on, the doors open, and the quality high over time. And the only way to do that is through strong systems, management structures, operating procedures, and boundaries.

Otherwise, the teenager you hired to open won’t show up. The cash register will be short. The bathroom will be dirty. You’ll run out of mozzarella. Eventually, these “headaches” pile up until you either close or run yourself ragged trying to do everything yourself.

So you might see a pizza shop owner. I see a process-and-procedures expert.

Maker / art / music business

The easy part of a maker business is making cool stuff. You know it’s the easy part because that’s the part people happily do as a hobby.

The hard part is sales—online marketing, selling to stores, pitching yourself to craft markets, social media, all of it. If you want to run a maker business, you’d better want to spend most of your day selling.

Seamstress / alterations business

I recently saw a flyer for a local seamstress and alterations business. Despite having been up for only a couple of weeks, all the tear-off phone numbers were already gone. That’s great—if the hard part of the business were finding customers.

But my hunch is that the real hard part of an alterations business is that customers tend to undervalue how complex and painstaking alterations actually are. There’s often a fundamental mismatch between what they want to pay and what you need to charge.

That mismatch can be reconciled—especially with strong customer vetting, onboarding, and project management—but there’s the hard part. And it’s one that few seamstresses probably love.

Cleaning, painting, or service business

What you think the hard part is: cleaning. Maybe getting your first few customers.

What the hard part actually is: getting long-term, consistent customers who are willing to pay your hourly rate.

That requires customer relationship management, proactive outreach and marketing to keep your funnel wide enough, and pricing and expectation-setting that support ongoing relationships rather than low-margin one-off jobs.

Martial arts gym, ballet school, or similar

It’s a common dream for a jiu-jitsu athlete or former ballerina to open their own academy. It makes sense—the idea of doing what you love while sharing it with others is deeply compelling.

Here’s the problem: this kind of business has multiple very real hard parts.

First, you’ll spend most of your time marketing to and onboarding new students. This can be fun at first, but it continues at an intense level for years.

Second, a physical space requires constant care: disinfecting mats, washing uniforms, maintaining equipment, managing everything that wears down simply by being used.

Third, every student needs you to be a coach, a community leader, and a technical expert. That requires an enormous amount of energy, skill, spiritual groundedness, planning, and sustained attention.

So the hard part of a business like this is that you’re juggling multiple full-time, sometimes contradictory, extremely demanding jobs—and you’ll need to execute them well for years, maybe decades.

You have to want to know what the hard part is, and want to do it.

I’ve been looking at different business types here, but the specifics of any business can shift where the hard part lives. A great location might make customer acquisition easier but drive up costs, turning profitability into the hard part. A bad location lowers costs but makes getting customers the hard part. Every business idea has its own constraints that shape the hard part.

If you can get better at correctly identifying the hard parts of a business, you’ll be able to assess your own ideas more honestly—and choose something that actually fits who you are and how you want to spend your time.

I often bemoan how unhelpful traditional business plans are, and this is yet another place they fail small business owners. If someone did no other planning at all, I’d still encourage them to answer this single question:

What are the hard parts of this business? And do I want to spend my days becoming extraordinary at those?

This past Monday marked the successful launch of Hey Neighbor: takeout from local cooks with global roots. Customers were able to order meals—from Oaxacan tamales and Salvadoran pupusas and sandwiches to Colombian empanadas— and pick them up hot and ready (or frozen to heat up later).

Below, I’m sharing our reflection process of what we set out to achieve with Hey Neighbor, what we’ve learned so far, and what might happen next.

The Intentions of Hey Neighbor

Our goal with Hey Neighbor was to better support people starting food businesses while connecting these entrepreneurs with their surrounding communities. The name "Hey Neighbor" reflects our core belief: dynamic, vibrant entrepreneurs are launching businesses all around us, and they need only modest support to truly thrive and contribute meaningfully to their neighborhoods. Meanwhile, community members want to be part of that entrepreneurial journey—to benefit from and contribute to the process. Hey Neighbor creates a simple way to bring these groups together, fostering connections that embody the spirit of saying "Hey Neighbor."

These are the needs we identified on both sides…

People who are in the earliest stages of starting food businesses need:

• A clear sales “case” for business development. Many are more likely to take essential steps—getting insurance, refining menus, setting pricing, starting bookkeeping—when these connect to concrete sales opportunities with defined requirements and support. One advisor of mine calls this “derisking” these steps — essentially lowering the risk of this investment of time, money, and focus by connecting it directly to revenue.

• Support with regulatory requirements. With any food business, permits, insurance, and the need for a commercial kitchen can become large barriers especially when you add challenges with language, technology, immigration status, etc.

• Access to new customers. Folks struggle to reach markets beyond their immediate social networks (for reasons of language, marketing experience, and others.)

At the same time, we notice that many consumers want to:

• Discover new foods and flavors.

• Support new entrepreneurs, perhaps especially immigrant entrepreneurs.

• Have an easy way to “deal with dinner and skip the dishes.”

Hey Neighbor was designed as a structured, supported sales platform that addressed these challenges and opportunities simultaneously. The Food Academy served as the entry point to Hey Neighbor. Over 30 days, we helped participating entrepreneurs refine their recipes, streamline production processes, navigate regulations, develop professional packaging, and explore sustainable business models. Together, the Food Academy and Hey Neighbor provided entrepreneurs with both practical skills and immediate sales channels. On the consumer side, we carefully balanced the menu between exciting new offerings and familiar favorites, while making the promotion and ordering process as intuitive as possible.

The cooks of Hey Neighbor (plus Emily) with their Food Academy completion certificates.

What It Took to Make It Happen

In some ways, Hey Neighbor is a simple idea. But of course, the rubber meets the road in details — and there were a lot of them!

In the weeks leading up to the event, the cooks — Yesid, Alma, Noemy, and Karla — worked hard on menu development, sourcing, and promotion.

Briico’s tiny team also worked full-time on the project:

• Doing intensive promotion including flyering, outreach to more than 100 organizations and individuals, social media, and more.

• Meeting regulatory requirements, filing paperwork, getting insurance, etc.

• Working in person with entrepreneurs to help them develop their products, pricing, and packaging.

• Securing a commercial kitchen that would meet our needs.

• Architecting the operations for both the food production and pickup.

• Creating and sourcing packaging and collateral.

• Providing end-to-end day-of support (it ended up being a team of 3 people present to support the entrepreneurs 8am-8pm with food prep, order dispatch, cleaning, and organization.)

This time around, Briico paid for the hard costs and staff time of Hey Neighbor — all food revenue went directly to the cooks, based on what they had sold.

Hard costs (printing, packaging, fees, etc) totaled $591. Staff costs (one month of one person working full-time and one person working part-time) would of course multiply that several-fold.

Marketing and promotion was of course a really important part of what our team contributed… here’s a peek inside that marketing effort:

What Happened

On July 21st, 2025, Hey Neighbor delivered remarkable results in its debut event. Four entrepreneurs from three countries—Karla, Alma, Yesid, and Noemy—generated $3,000 in direct revenue while serving 65 families across the community. This meant each cook averaged $750 in sales (for 1-1.5 days of work), while collectively preparing 605 individual tamales, pupusas, empanadas, and other items in a single day.

Obviously, the success of the event was due to the focus, professionalism, creativity, and optimistic outlooks of the cooks. At every turn, the cooks demonstrated what true entrepreneurship looks like: thoughtful planning and strategic purchasing, seamless collaboration in a shared kitchen space, graceful adaptation when timing shifted and logistics changed, and remarkable resilience juggling childcare responsibilities alongside the demands of a marathon cooking day. They maintained their professionalism and positive energy through every challenge, cleaned meticulously as they worked, and supported each other without a hint of drama or competition. Their ability to execute at such a high level while navigating the inevitable complexities of a first-time event speaks to both their individual capabilities and their collaborative spirit—qualities that will undoubtedly serve them well as their businesses continue to grow.

The event also represented the successful culmination of the 30-day Food Academy, transforming participating entrepreneurs from program graduates into active business owners with proven market demand and immediate revenue. But the $3,000 generated that day represents just the beginning—the business development skills, regulatory knowledge, packaging expertise, and customer base each entrepreneur gained through the process positions them to generate potentially tens of thousands of dollars annually for decades to come.

Evaluating Success: Impact vs. Sustainability

By nonprofit standards, Hey Neighbor was successful. With hard costs of just $591, we generated $3,000 in direct revenue for entrepreneurs—a 5:1 return on investment before considering the substantive business development impact on four emerging food entrepreneurs.

However, as we consider Hey Neighbor's future, we're weighing two critical perspectives. From a grant-funded nonprofit lens, these results justify continued investment and expansion. The combination of immediate revenue generation, business skill development, and community building delivered measurable impact at a reasonable cost.

From a sustainability and scalability perspective, the intensive staffing requirements and logistical complexity raise important questions. While the current model works well for periodic, grant-supported events, our goal is to create systems that can serve many more entrepreneurs with decreasing marginal costs—ultimately becoming self-sustaining or even revenue-positive.

What we learned

The core concept and format proved highly successful, demonstrating strong demand, significant business development impact on entrepreneurs, and meaningful community engagement.

• Sales exceeded everyone's expectations, proving market demand on both the producer and consumer sides

• The participating cooks were exceptionally positive about the experience - more so than previous Briico Business Program graduates - expressing pride in their accomplishments, satisfaction with revenue, and strong collaborative spirit

• Entrepreneurs achieved significant business development milestones in preparation for the event, including understanding insurance, developing new products, refining pricing strategies, exploring promotional opportunities, and navigating regulatory requirements.

• Customers responded with enthusiasm, patience, and encouragement, praising the food quality and supporting the community initiative.

• The partnership with Old Dutch Church operated seamlessly, providing an ideal venue and collaborative relationship.

• The event successfully demonstrated the viability of knitting together community while providing concrete revenue and business development benefits to local food entrepreneurs.

The event required significantly more preparation time, staffing, and logistical coordination than anticipated, making it difficult to deliver quality service while maintaining reasonable economics.

• We underestimated food preparation time, starting at 8am for 4pm-6pm pickups when we should have started at 5am or split preparation across two days (frozen items prepared the day before).

• The combination of hot food and ready-to-freeze items created complex operational challenges, with hot food requiring precise timing for cooking, packaging, and dispatch.

• It demanded staffing levels that could undermine the project's economics. Even with me, my husband and niece helping the entire day, we struggled to maintain adequate service. Ideally, each cook would have needed a dedicated assistant, plus we required a full-day logistics manager and additional pickup staff - creating labor costs that would be difficult to justify against the revenue generated.

• Cooking fell 1-3 hours behind schedule, making pickup more chaotic than ideal with customers waiting long periods, some having to return for missing items, and food not going out as hot as intended.

What Is Next

So the question is… where do we go from here? Specifically, is there a way to:

• Change the offering and/or the operations so that the time/money "loss" of each event is minimal (or, ideally, net positive)?

• Use the structure of the event for many more cooks without the logistical complexity multiplying proportionally?

• Build toward a model that doesn't require my full-time attention to execute (and can thus exist alongside other important aspects of Briico’s work)?

Hey Neighbor proved it can deliver immediate, measurable impact while building foundations for long-term economic development. The challenge ahead isn't whether this model works but whether we can redesign the operations and offerings to serve more entrepreneurs without compromising quality or sustainability. The staffing intensity and logistical complexity we experienced may require fundamental changes to how we structure future events, potentially reimagining everything from the menu to the pickup process. The success, determination, and professionalism of Karla, Alma, Yesid, and Noemy shows us what's possible—now we need to determine how to make it replicable and sustainable.

You can’t fail at business if you don’t quit.

I was reminded this past week (in a BJJ context via Stephan Kesting) that perseverance is about two things: 1) getting started 2) keeping going.

If there’s something we don’t want to fail at, all we have to do is to keep working at those two things.

A quote I think of often

“Receive the children in reverence, educate them in love, and send them forth in freedom.” — Rudolf Steiner.

Sometimes you can just ask

I believe that our work should solve a problem people know they have, in the way they want it solved.

5 ways to ask the people you serve whether you have accomplished that:

• See if they’ll pay for it.

• See if they recommend it to someone else.

• See if they come back to do it again.

• Ask the Sean Ellis question.

• Have a vulnerable and human conversation about what their experience was like with your product or service and really listen.

All are good. Just don’t do none of them for long.

… Perhaps every journey I’ve taken.

What it means to work for freedom

Tim Kennedy is a former UFC middleweight contender who served in the US Army as a Green Beret sniper. When asked what he would put on a billboard if given the chance, he said:

“Everything you want is on the far side of hard work.”

He went on to elaborate: “We’re in a culture of entitlement. Everyone wants the quick, easy, fast everything… But everything you want is on the far side of hard work. That goes for everything: success, work, sleep — everything. It goes for freedom. The only place freedom exists is on the far side of work… And I would just say to everyone: go work for freedom.”

Some people hear the word freedom in a quote like that and feel a sense of resonance, a reminder of what is true and important. Others hear it and feel dismissive, associating those words with systems and values they don’t support.

For me, the concept of working for freedom is one that I find powerful. Ultimately my work revolves around this idea of working to create freedom for as many people as possible. And the specific way I feel called to do that is by helping people with very few pathways to economic advancement create freedom for themselves through microbusiness.

I am passionate about that approach both because I’ve seen first-hand the liberatory impacts of microbusiness ownership on so many people. But also because it fits within a theoretical framework that I think is almost unassailable. When I was in college, I remember sitting in a laundromat as I read Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen’s book, Development As Freedom. I looked up from the book, out the door of the dark laundromat, and had one of those transcendent moments of clarity where it felt like the curtain had been pulled back on how things really worked.

Sen’s core concept (per this good summary) is that “Poverty is characterized by lack of at least one freedom, including a de facto lack of political rights and choice, vulnerability to coercive relations, and exclusion from economic choices and protections.” And a common quote pulled from the book, an encapsulating concept, is: “no famine has ever taken place in a functioning democracy."

This conceptualization of what development really is — on a personal, national, or worldwide level — helps me filter ideas and approaches: does this project/choice/format/money/relationship/etc create more freedom? It’s been almost endlessly clarifying when it comes to choosing what projects to pursue and how to structure them.

So yes, Tim Kennedy’s exhortation to work for freedom resonates with me. We all benefit from freedom at any level… and we all benefit from working for freedom — individually and collectively.

A quote I’ve been mulling over

“Truth in observation — that will win a fight.”

In my work, in my parenting, in my personal development: this has been resonating. (It’s a quote from the trainer of an Olympic boxer, via a story told in Sam Sheridan’s book.) It of course reminds you of Richard P. Feynman’s famous reminder: “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”

Things that are bad for economic growth

• Fear.

• People hiding at home, rather than starting businesses or going to school or taking their kids to afterschool programs.

• Low birth rate, if left uncountered by other sources of population growth.

• Small business owners struggling to hire affordable employees or have them show up for work.

How I felt this week trying to create concrete workplans from some bigger ideas I have

@tonystatovci @tonystatovci ♬ original sound - TONY STATOVCI

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1. Does anyone want what you made?
   In the early days of Wholesale In a Box, I was introduced to the Sean Ellis test and we used it at several key junctures to get to product-market fit. As Lenny summarizes: The “Sean Ellis Test” is a leading indicator of product-market fit. Run it by asking your users, “How would you feel if you could no longer use this product?” with options: “Very disappointed,” “Somewhat disappointed,” “Not disappointed,” or “Not applicable.” If 40% or more respond with “Very disappointed,” you have a strong indication of PMF. It sounds almost overly simple, but indeed, over the last 8 years, I’ve found this to be a really useful tool to assess in a simple way whether you are building something that people want. Obviously there are a lot of subtleties (arguably the most important work of the business) in figuring out what to do with this information. But first you have to have the information. We’ve been exploring this with Cobble. And it’s been helpful as a focusing tool.
   

2. Status and affiliation.
   OG Seth Godin is as great as ever. Listened to him on the Tim Ferriss podcast this week. And he said that human beings seek three things: status, affiliation, and freedom from fear. Maybe they also seek growth and contribution and other things, but putting a spotlight on status and affiliation is helpful to me since as a person, I don’t tend to be as driven by those needs as by other needs (e.g., for autonomy and accomplishment.) It’s made me realize that how important it is for Briico to not only be effective (in helping people build a profitable business in 30 days or less) but also to help people get status and affiliation. This is a big area of opportunity for our work.
   

3. Dancing with AI.
   Speaking of Seth Godin, he has this concept of “dancing at the edge of finished.” I’m a bit of a reluctant adopter with AI. I don’t like fussing with new tools. And I don’t like wasting time on things that feel enmeshed in a lot of drama. But I’m not sure there’s a smart way of continuing to work that doesn’t contemplate AI in it. And recently I’ve found ways of dancing with the edge of AI that feel really fun. For instance:

   • Using ChatGPT as a personal writing assistant (especially fleshing out bullet points or examples once a piece is almost done)

   • Learning about Lovable and envisioning how a broad community of people could benefit from it

   • Wondering how the new tool Rosie might help folks who don’t speak English run their service businesses.
     

4. Reading:
   The Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin and re-reading Show Your Work by Austin Kleon.
   

5. What’s the hard part?
   One of the most important questions you can ask about any business idea is: what’s the hard part of this business? If you want to build a business making money from affiliate links or online courses, the hard part is building an audience. If you want to run a real estate company, the hard part is saying no to 999 opportunities and knowing which is the right one. Every business has a hard part and you should pick a hard part that you want to devote your days to.

xo,
Emily

In June, we held our most recent cohort of the Briico Business Program. The program builds on the work we’ve done over the last year and a half or so, creating the best ways to support people create thriving livelihoods through microbusiness.

We ran our first full cohort of the 21-day program in June, 2024. And the results were pretty incredible. During the 21 days of the program:

• 100% of people established their business.

• Most people got to profitability.

• Participants spent an average of just $200 on startup costs (which we covered.)

Read on to get the full rundown. Or watch this quick 40-second peek inside the program:

About The Briico Business Program

The Briico Business Program is a 3-week program run one-on-one (via WhatsApp) that helps participants start a profitable, fully legal microbusiness in 30 days or less.

It’s for people who have a skill in home services (cleaning, painting, construction, etc) OR food production and want to start a part-time or full-time business. Our focus is on new immigrants but all are welcome to apply (and many participants were not immigrants).

A quick peek inside how the project works

• Online, one-on-one delivery. Our program is delivered on a one-on-one basis, daily for three weeks.

• Clear, bite-sized training and to-dos. Each day, the participant gets nuggets of key information (via short videos) and small tasks they need to do.

• We do key things for you. Our team also delivers key things at the right times (e.g., completing key paperwork for them) and is a sounding board for questions. 

• Pro coaching in your language. Each participant has their own coach who chats with them via WhatsApp, serving as an expert consultant, project manager, and trainer. 

• Crucial business foundations. Upon completion of the program, the participant has: a DBA or LLC, an EIN, business insurance, basic brand and marketing materials, a website, clear pricing and service offerings, an understanding of all the key levers in their business and how to grow, and a functioning system to get clients. 

• Moving from zero to revenue in less than 30 days. With every participant, our goal is to establish a strong business foundation, get to revenue, and be set up for continued growth. In other words, they are making money and know how to grow.

• Grow Now, Pay Later. With this cohort, we experimented with a “grow now, pay later” model in which participants get the course (valued at $399) for free, plus $200 in cash to cover their startup expenses. In exchange, they plan to contribute a small percentage of their revenues 6-12 months later.

What Makes It Different

• Believing in people.
  You don’t need a fancy idea, education, money, citizenship, or even much time to start a successful microbusiness. You just need to want to do it, have a skill or passion you’re building on, and dive into our system.

• Focus on Lo-Hi Businesses. We support folks in starting businesses that are low-capital, low-regulation, low cost to run… but high demand, high hourly wage, and high potential. This model gives our clients a high chance of success.

• A clear, effective, method to follow. In working with 2,000 business owners over the past 20 years, we’ve found a strong series of actions that give someone the best possible chance to thrive (especially when adapted to their unique situation.)

• World-class coaching.
  We honor our clients’ time by using a responsive concierge approach. For instance, communicating entirely on WhatsApp, accepting payment in cash if needed, creating videos in each person’s language, responding quickly and providing quick turnaround on information or support, and more.

• High-touch services.
  Of course, capacity building is important. But at some key junctures, it works well to provide concrete, high-touch services rather than providing "advice.”

• Personalized curriculum and path forward.
  We develop bite-sized and "just in time" education and training videos that are just the tidbit folks need at the moment they need it (in the language and delivery mechanism that they want.) Also, we make sure that each person’s path forward and curriculum are unique to their needs and vision.

The June 2024 Participants

The Briico Business Program does have an application process, but our criteria for acceptance are simple:

• They want to start a low-capital microbusiness in home services or food.

• They have a skill or passion to build on (e.g., you’re great at cooking for family).

• They are ready to start now.

• They are accountable and responsive.

• They are willing to be uncomfortable to grow their business.

Our participants had those things in common, but other than that, each person came from a different background:

• Some were US citizens, others new immigrants.

• Some had legal immigration status in the US, others didn’t.

• Some spoke English, others didn’t.

• Some are adept at technology and have advanced degrees, others don’t.

• Some were already working on their business, others hadn’t started.

• Most were parents, women, and people of color.

• There was about a 70/30 split between home services businesses and food businesses.

• Countries of origin included Haiti, Afghanistan, Jamaica, United States, Ecuador, and Colombia.

It’s an extraordinary honor to work with these individuals. Every single of these people is optimistic, thoughtful, persistent, hardworking, kind, and generous. They’re going to be excellent business owners.

Outcomes of the June 2024 Briico Business Cohort

High Level Outcomes:

During the 21-day program:

• 100% of people established their business.

• Most people got to revenue and profitability.

• Participants spent an average of just $200 on startup costs (which we covered.)

Examples:

• Zehra arrived to the US only a few months ago and did not have any income when she started the program. She established a cleaning business during the program and was making $2K/month with about 4 days/month of work.

• Sophia started a homestyle meal takeout/delivery service, cooking from a commercial kitchen. During the program she developed the meals, got established with a commercial kitchen, set up the business, started selling wholesale to a local grocery store, and started her first weekly meal deliveries.

• Vanika got her cleaning business running during the program and ended with 7 clients, making about $2500/month.

These results, while exciting and inspiring, are common among participants in the program.

*Names changed above

Outcome Details:

• Every single person who completed the 21-day program started their business.

• Of the 11 people we accepted into the program, 9 completed it.

• About 60% of people moved fast enough to get to their revenue during the program and of those, the average "days to first dollar" was 15 days (with everyone under 21 days).

• The other 40% are still putting final pieces together but should be to their first dollar within 45 days.

Why It Matters

The short answer:

Starting a business can change your life. If you do it right, it gives you an immediate income lift, lets you work around family commitments, and gives you a path to long-term growth.

The long answer:

Supporting high-potential, under-resourced people in achieving economic stability has large positive impacts on the health, achievement, and development of their entire family, their community, and even (due to remittances) on their communities of origin.

So how do you support people in achieving economic stability?

In my experience, starting a microbusiness is an incredibly effective, fast, high ROI way to consistently support people in creating a thriving livelihood. Microbusiness is an powerful leverage point because anyone, of any immigration status, can legally start a business in the US – if they know the right ways to go about it and have the right support to reach profitability. Most people have some existing skill from wage work (ranging from making tortillas to installing drywall) that can be turned into a microbusiness – often bringing them out of risky illegal wage work, increasing hourly rates by 2x-5x, and giving them pathways to ongoing income increases.

Surprisingly, there aren’t a lot of good global models for supporting microbusiness growth, especially for microbusinesses and lower literacy populations. As an example, providing a 15-week workshop, writing a business plan, and getting ready to access capital is a standard – but the randomized controlled trials around this, across multiple countries, prove it to be ineffective, not to mention expensive to deliver.

What We Learned

• The program’s structure and content is roughly right.
  Overall, the content and how we delivered it felt incisive and helpful.

• Program pacing is important (and should be fast, but steady.)
  This cohort worked well overall in terms of structure, but there were a couple of periods of the program that felt too rushed, and a couple that felt too slow. So we’re expanding the program to be 4 weeks instead of 3, and rejiggering what goes where so that participants can keep up a fast but steady pace throughout.

• People’s ability to pay varies dramatically.
  For some participants, even a $25 cost could have been prohibitive. But for others, money was not a barrier. This made us wonder about more of a sliding scale (or fee, plus scholarships) model moving forward rather than the “grow now, pay later” model which might benefit as much from participants who are happy to pay at the start of the program.

• Covering $200 of startup expenses is powerful.
  It seemed to work well to cover $200 of folks' startup expenses. It didn't turn out to be hard to manage and people were judicious with their use of the funds. In several cases, a $50 or $100 expense would have stopped forward progress and the $200 funds were able to keep things moving forward (and ultimately towards profit.)

• We need to produce more, and better, video resources.
  In some cases, we were scrambling to teach folks one-one-one when a well-produced video would have been more effective. Also, we found that very granular, practical videos are more useful than longer overview videos. We ended the cohort with a punchlist of video resources to produce.

• The subtitles on English videos aren’t adequate for understanding.
  For participants who don’t speak English, there is often a literacy limitation as well. So it’s worth the time and expense to produce multiple videos in multiple languages, rather than depending on subtitles to do the work for us.

• It’s OK to help people develop their product/offering.
  Several people didn’t have a firm product/offering when they started the program. We were worried that this product development phase would bog them down but overall, we were able to move through this phase with them productively and efficiently.

• We need to make sure people aren’t too busy to participate.
  The only people who dropped out of the program did so because “life” got in the way. The program is flexible and allows for a full-time workload and family commitments — but for a couple of people, they got overloaded beyond that level. It may be good to make the time commitment clearer, earlier so that people can be realistic about what they’re facing and join at a later date if needed.

What’s Next

We're going to run our next cohort of the Briico Business Program starting July 29th.

We’re working on refinements and changes to the program structure as well as doing a lot of video production to support the program.

Business model, funding sources, and the best outreach approaches are all things we’re also exploring as we go. If you want to support the work or collaborate with us, we would greatly appreciate it (just reach out.)

THANK YOU to every single one of our program participants! You are inspiring and you are getting it done, every day! Thank you to Teju Ravilochan, Daniel Woodham, Joshua Stratton-Rayner, Lexi Hanauer, and Etan Kerr-Finell for your strategic and practical support with this cohort.

Early last year as I was starting this project, New York was seeing the arrival of tens of thousands of asylum seekers per month — many of them housed in former hotels. Thankfully, I managed to get an under-the-radar approval from DocGo, the organization that runs the hotel programs, to meet with individuals and run workshops at a shelter in Newburgh, NY. And so I perched in the lobby, working with hundreds of people over the span of a few months – on everything from drivers’ licenses to bank accounts to food handler certifications to starting businesses.

My conversations and work with these dynamic, capable, optimistic people were incredibly motivating because each person seemed to harbor such sparkling potential to build and thrive. And it seemed that even the smallest supports in doing so yielded immediate effects.

So I tried to move as quickly as possible to build what they (and their new communities as secondary beneficiaries) deserved. Over the past 14 months, I ended up doing 17 projects: each one, an experiment to find the highest leverage, most effective ways in supporting new immigrants in creating thriving livelihoods.

The two things I am utterly convinced of, after working with hundreds of new immigrants:

• Immigrants are not more mouths to feed, but more hands to help. If they come here and we support them in starting legal, profitable businesses, they become the lifeblood of our economy, creating new jobs and economic opportunities.

• It is absolutely possible to support any motivated new immigrant in starting a business in 10-30 days, with $100-$1000 of investment, that nets them $1,000-$3,000/month.

I’ve also learned a heap of really specific things about what does and does not work to provide that support, what the key leverage points are to make profit quickly, how to provide meaningful training that is actually useful, what types of businesses are best to start, how people want to pay or reciprocate for the services, what skills and assets can be leveraged and translated to a new context, and much more.

Below I’m sharing more specifics about these learnings as well as what I did to discover them… and I intend to continue sharing insights as the project evolves and grows.

Why Migrants and Why Microbusiness

Millions of migrants come to the US every year – fleeing danger and persecution and going through horrific journeys to get here.2 They endure violence, rape, robbery, and terror in the hope that when they arrive they will be able to work hard, thrive, and contribute. But once they get here – too many of these energetic, high-potential people find the obstacles to advancing are impossible to overcome. They languish in low-paying, dead-end jobs and don’t find ways to thrive and contribute in the way they dreamed. It’s a tragic denouement to heroic journeys – and a true waste of human potential.

It doesn’t have to be that way though. With the right support, these folks can skip the years of “gray economy” subsistence and almost immediately start paying taxes, hiring, and contributing to their communities. Microbusiness – because it is accessible to any immigration status, requires little capital, and has unlimited growth potential – can be one of the most powerful tools for immigrants’ thriving.

I know that people are often skeptical of the potential of microbusiness for new immigrants. But in my work3, I’ve pretty consistently found that it’s very possible to support someone, of any immigration status, in legally starting a profitable microbusiness in less than 30 days with less than $500. Obviously, it’s not the right path for everyone. Some immigrants are professionals in their country and need support finding that path here. Some simply intend to get a basic job and stay at it for decades. But many, many people are vibrant, talented, ambitious, generous individuals who can find a leverage point for those gifts in creating and growing microbusinesses.

Where I Started

Last year, right after my younger son turned 1, I felt a strong pull to explore this question of how we might support the potential of people who come to the US as migrants. It’s not exactly an altruistic project – it’s more borne of the frustration of seeing wasted potential and wanting to do the obvious thing to stop that waste. Obviously no one was going to pay me to pursue this so for the last 14 months, I’ve eked out a bit of money for our family from another business I run. And I worked full-time on this project, on an unpaid basis — not so much as a “volunteer” but more with the ethos of a startup founder who is willing to invest “sweat equity” now for results later. I embarked on this as the mom of a then 1-year-old and 4-year old, making do with a household income of less than $25,000/year for that time. I mention that because it can be hard to devote one’s full-time energy on a project that isn’t making any money. But it’s not impossible.

I started in February 2023 with a few things I’d already learned in my work with immigrants, small business, and startups:

• ITINs4 are an important leverage point for undocumented people to start legal microbusinesses. Anyone in the US can start their own business, completely legally. And an ITIN number is the starting point.

• Most small business education and support isn’t effective. Having been a business advisor at the SBA myself, I can attest that the model is oriented around taking a 15-week course, writing comprehensive business plans, and then getting debt to finance your project. My experience and the data has shown this model to be less effective than the control group (of no intervention), especially for lower-literacy folks, English learners, or people with lower abilities to pay down loans once they get them.

• Lo-hi businesses are powerful vehicles: those with low capital investments, low overhead costs, low regulatory requirements, and high potential. That’s where I wanted to focus with Briico.

• The world needs small business to thrive. The future is driven by their innovation, community building, ethics, and renegade nature. There are 30 million small businesses in the US, employing almost half of the country: they are the lifeblood of every community in America.

17 Projects in 14 Months

Over the past year or so, I’ve tried to stay really close to one thing: learning as quickly as possible what the most effective, fastest ways are of supporting new immigrants in creating thriving livelihoods. The reason for that is simple – that is what the vast majority of new arrivals want – and it is what their new communities need from them. I wasn’t even necessarily married to the idea of using microbusiness as a tool, although that remained a powerful hunch. So that looked like “experiments” or small projects exploring different aspects of this. My goal with all of these experiments was to provide something of value to the people I was serving at the same time as I learned how to be even more effective in the future. And I wanted to move through that work as fast as possible. The less time spent on iterations, the more time I could spend on delivering the thing or things that worked.

These are the projects created over the past 14 months:

• Research & Discovery Period.

  Did ~30 interviews with aspiring small business owners ; Reviewed 100+ academic papers and Randomized Controlled Trials relating to small business support and teaching entrepreneurship.

• App for Microbusiness.

  Wireframed and did user interviews around creation of an App (like Duolingo for immigrant business).

• In-Person Microbusiness Workshop Series.

  • Kingston, NY. Business Boost Workshop Series and 1-on-1 work with participants. The workshop sold out and participants were a vibrant, experienced group with a range of business stages and industries and speaking 4 languages, coming from 6 countries. Business owners are embarking on food businesses, construction and rehab, spice import, product development and retail, cleaning businesses, interior design, specialty grocery, and more.

  • Albany, NY. Partnered with a nonprofit serving Albany area refugees, RISSE, to create a short workshop on “microbusiness pathways.”

• Asylum-Seeker Support in Newburgh, NY Shelter.

  Worked at a shelter for newly arrived asylum-seekers. We started with case management to understand the needs of the 100+ people staying there. And developed a set of quickly delivered programs to support them:

  • Business Pathways training, in Arabic, French, and English

  • ServSafe Food Handler's Training and Exam (required for food businesses and helpful for many food job opportunities.)

  • Bank account opening.

  • Pro bono ITIN applications.

  • One-on-one microbusiness support. One became profitable in less than 10 days and quintupled their hourly wage.

  • Resume creation support.

  • Jobseeking support.

• Low-cost Online ITIN Service.

  Developed a low-cost, rapid system for helping people get ITIN numbers, a crucial leverage point for undocumented folks to start legal businesses. We developed the knowledge to

• WhatsApp Newsletter & CRM System.

  Created WhatsApp newsletter and made WhatsApp based customer support systems

• FB & Google Ads outreach.

  Figured out how to use FB and Google Ads effectively to reach this audience.

• County and City Partnerships.

  Forged initial partnerships with local county and city government.

• Home Services Company model.
  Built initial pilot of a home services company that would train, hire, and create entrepreneurial opportunities for people providing services like handyman, cleaning, remodeling, etc.

• Briico Kits.

  An all-in-one 3-week program providing the one-on-one support, training, and framework to start a profitable microbusiness in less than 30 days. Have run weekly cohorts of this program, continuing to refine as we go.

What I’ve Learned About Supporting New Immigrants In Starting Microbusinesses

The learnings from these projects were dynamic, illuminating, broad, and deep. It feels almost impossible to summarize them adequately. And I hope to write more on many of these insights.

Some of what I’ve learned included:

• New immigrants are high-potential people, not “huddled masses.”

  When I first arrived at the asylum-seeker shelter in Newburgh, I’ll admit I was concerned these new arrivals would be exhausted, traumatized, and needing more immediate care than I could provide. What I found was just the opposite: dynamic, optimistic, capable people, eager to work and contribute. I met Abdullah who knows five languages and ran a 3-location restaurant in his country before being sentenced to death for leaving Islam. I met Omar and Muhammed who were so skillful and motivated that they started their car detailing business - profitably - in less than 10 days with $600 of their earnings from a bakery. I met Guttemberk, who had already started and run an HVAC company in Venezuela when he was 19. My friend Teju Ravilochan said it best, that the work is about a paradigm shift from looking at new immigrants as “more mouths to feed” to “more hands to help.” My experience has been that the vast majority of new immigrants are people with huge potential to thrive and contribute.

• ​​Their entrepreneurial plans are dynamic and multifactorial.

  They don’t necessarily have “a business idea” but rather are looking at various options and resources and need support that meets that dynamism. Their legal status, other family members’ employment, and other factors are interrelated with their business plans, ideas, and potentials. And, they’re multiskilled, richly backgrounded people and may have many potential options to pursue. They have and want diversified livelihoods (a mix of income sources and projects) -- not a unified pursuit of entrepreneurship. And they tend to work in regional/cultural groups (learning, sharing info and resources, pursuing ideas), not just as individuals.

• It’s best to treat them like busy, high-potential, young executives.

  One of the most discouraging, deadening realities of many immigrants’ lives is that they are treated as if their time doesn’t matter. In reality, using their time well is sometimes a matter of life and death (as they hustle to generate income to pay for asylum cases)... and always a high-yield opportunity. So we try to approach everything with a high level of responsiveness, urgency, and creativity – a “concierge” approach. For instance communicating entirely on WhatsApp, accepting payment in cash if needed, creating videos in their language, responding quickly and providing quick turnaround on information or support, etc.

• “Done for me” services can be important.

  Of course, training and capacity building is important. But at some key junctures, it works well to provide concrete, high-touch services (as you might with a busy executive) - just do the thing for them if helpful - rather than providing "advice" in many cases.

• People need training at the time they need it, in a way that directly meets their situation.

  This is about developing bite-sized and "just in time" education and training videos that are just the tidbit folks need at the moment they need it, rather than a 12-week business course they sign up for 3 months in advance.

• It remains crucial to focus on “lo-hi” business opportunities.

  These are those with low capital investments, low overhead costs, low regulatory requirements, and high potential – things like cottage food businesses, home services, and the like.

• There are three main things people need in order to be successful in starting profitable, high-potential microbusinesses.

  It all boils down to: seeing what’s possible, know exactly what they need to do to achieve that (given their unique situation), and support taking those steps.

What’s Next in 2024

Despite the pace and depth of the past months’ progress, I still feel a lot of urgency to move forward as quickly as possible. If I’m being completely honest, I sometimes feel the personal financial pressure of working so long on an unpaid project without a firm business model — and I feel very acutely the extreme waste caused by so many people being unsupported in the ways they deserve. But ultimately, I’m happy with the pace at which I’m moving towards strong solutions and the strong execution and deep human caring with which its happening.

I’m especially excited about the directions we’re moving in over the rest of 2024, which build on what we’ve learned and push as quickly as possible to deeper insights and more effective supports.

Briico’s 2024 Projects and Focuses:

• Running cohorts of people through our Briico Business program. This online 3-week program (managed largely via WhatsApp) focuses on showing folks what is possible with low-capital, high-potential businesses… providing personal, daily bite-sized education and support… and providing high-touch services at key leverage points. The goal here is to get better and better at supporting people in starting profitable businesses in 10-30 days by analyzing cohorts and doing microexperiments within the program.

• Focusing on home services businesses and cottage food businesses. We’ve found that many folks bring a skill and interest in either home services (painting, cleaning, construction, etc) or in small food businesses that can be run without a commercial space (often called “cottage food” businesses). And by using that skill as a starting point, folks can jump much more quickly into the profitable phases of their business. These businesses also meet our standards as “lo-hi” businesses — those with low capital investments, low overhead costs, low regulatory requirements, and high potential.

• Creating a local buying club for cottage foods. On an individual basis, it has proven to be very useful for new entrepreneurs when I can connect them with a handful of concrete sales opportunities at the start of the business. I’m curious about approaching that a bit more systematically by organizing consumers into buying clubs for these new businesses and products. The vision is to work with groups of new immigrants to start or grow home-based food businesses, and then set up a group of families who want to get weekly "baskets" (like a CSA) with a set of those goods. For instance, if you signed up, maybe you'd pay $40/week and get 4 tamales, a loaf of whole wheat bread, a Guatemalan stew mix, an Afghan desert, and 4 arepas. And each week, we send out recipes and stories of the entrepreneurs, the foods, and the cultures they come from.

• Piloting a “pay it forward” business model in which we provide the program for free (along with a small grant to cover startup costs in many cases)-- and then once the entrepreneur is profitable, they contribute a small percentage of profits to pay for others to go through the program.

I’m really grateful for the encouragement, collaboration, partnership, bits of funding, and discerning questions that so many people have helped me with along the way. It’s such an honor to get to do this work.