“Having a business sounds like a wonderful dream, but it’s really very tough,” he says. “You’re by yourself, your plans may not be working out, and you’re trying to figure out how to solve problems or keep things growing.”
Sortino faced no shortage of those challenges in trying to get his teddy bear business off the ground. When local retailers were initially reluctant to market the hand-crafted toys, he began selling them from a pushcart in Burlington, Vermont’s famous downtown marketplace. The bears’ popularity led to a small manufacturing operation and efforts to wholesale the products to specialty stores.
“The moral of Jim’s story was that customers often associate product details with quality,” Sortino says. “That story became a life lesson in marketing that I’ve used ever since. We began working details into our ads such as how our bears had 14 stitches per inch. We also expanded our radio advertising to New York City and other Northeast markets. It didn’t take long for sales to start climbing again.”
When Sortino planned a new factory to meet the increasing demand, he again called SCORE. Al Huber, an expert in factory operations, helped to engineer the bear-making process, including setting up the various manufacturing stages.
By the early 1990s, the Vermont Teddy Bear Company had become a national phenomenon. Soon after transitioning from a privately held business to a public corporation, the company was ranked 21st on Inc. magazine’s list of fastest growing public companies in 1994. The company has since added Internet shopping and broadened its product offering to include other gift items.
Sortino left the Vermont Teddy Bear Company in 1995 to pursue other interests, and he is now a highly sought-after business consultant. He also authored the Complete Idiot’s Guide to Successful Entrepreneuring, now in its fifth printing, and he is currently negotiating to write a series of business books for high school students.
Among the many lessons Sortino shares with his clients is the value of SCORE counseling.
“When possible, people should talk to SCORE counselors and get different perspectives, because they have so much information and experience to share,” he says. “It’s like the gods of business coming in to help you be successful.”
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