With a name like Nancy?s Heavenly Treats, it?s fitting that Nancy Christman came up with the name for her wholesale baked goods business in church. Christman, who has been making her signature Hungarian Nut Rolls since learning the recipe from a friend of Hungarian descent in the early 1980s, used to make the decadent walnut-laden pastries just for friends and family as well as fundraisers at Pughtown Baptist Church. It wasn?t long until she had a following, with customers asking Nancy when and where they could next purchase the pastries.

Prior to this venture, the Christmans, who met as classmates at Owen J. Roberts High School and married shortly after graduation in 1965, owned and operated the Evergreen Bed & Breakfast on 29 acres in the Moosehead Lake region of Maine from 1986 to 1996. Later, Nancy worked as an inspector for Bed & Breakfasts throughout the country. They eventually moved back to North Coventry to be closer to their children and grandchildren. John started a contracting business, Christman Construction, while Nancy cultivated a garden design business and made baked goods as a hobby. But the physical garden work became increasingly difficult for Nancy, who suffers from arthritis. And so she decided to concentrate on making the nut rolls and other baked goods. John built and finished the roomy addition himself. It includes a homey kitchen area with a large granite-topped island which provides lots of room for rolling out pastries, as well as a small office and plenty of space for a large baking oven and cooling racks. He also helps out with the preparation and packaging of the baked goods for shipping.

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search for : wholesale baked goods business, garden design business

How important is the initial start-up cost (price point) of an online or home based business opportunity? This is a very delicate subject that is often not credited with enough significance. Hitting the right ?sweet spot? with start-up costs can literally make or break your success in the online entrepreneurial world. Call it what you want ? ?price point?, ?start-up cost?, ?price threshold? (the initial fee to get registered and started in an online opportunity), but it is crucial that this amount is not priced too low, or too high.

Most people who join high ticket business opportunities ($2,000 to $10,000) are not told about the high cost of making each sale (the average cost of acquiring a new customer). Advertising is your most significant ongoing investment. Online beginners hear that an opportunity is? $3,500 (for example) and forget that this amount will only get them started. What about advertising? What about ongoing maintenance fees? (turn-key websites, accounting and training services, etc.) For an opportunity with a flat start-up cost of $3,500, your average cost per sale can range from $1,000 to $4,000. Why you ask? Because, as mentioned above, businesses with higher price points narrow your field of prospects dramatically, so you must advertise more to adjust for the waste, or pay significantly higher rates for upper income prospects

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search for : home based business, online opportunity

Opportunities for small, women- and minority-owned firms to do business with Phoenix are growing, so much so that the city wants more companies to consider becoming certified through its diversity programs. That was the message Thursday from city officials at a forum on the city’s Minority, Women & Small Business Enterprise programs at Burton Barr Central Library. Certified and non-certified businesses were invited to air their concerns about the programs. The city urges contractors working on municipal construction projects to seek bids from firms certified as small businesses or those owned by minorities or women. City departments also seek certified firms to fulfill purchasing orders.

The type of information requests that we have in order for people to go through the process of documentation that they need to provide, at the end of the day is that really going to be worth it for them. Do one and one equal two? At the end of the day is it going to benefit me? So I think one of the misconceptions is that if you go through the process, at the end of the rainbow . . . there may not be a pot of gold, but there’s opportunity . So as a result of becoming certified, I try to explain to people . . . that becoming certified equals opportunity. The other thing that happens is once you get into our database . . . it helps people to avail themselves to other resources. It’s about building bridges and making linkages for people, connecting people to the right people and to information, and that’s what certification does. And it’s bigger than just having a certificate and a piece of paper.

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search for : minority-owned firm, diversity program, Minority, Women & Small Business Enterprise program

The challenges faced by Wales if women are to achieve true equality are revealed today in a new report. It suggests that women have still not achieved equality in terms of pay, and experience widespread discrimination. In its annual review, launched to coincide with International Women’s Day, the Equal Opportunities Commission in Wales highlighted the six key issues that need to be tackled. The Gender Agenda also suggested how the new Commission for Equality and Human Rights (CEHR) can rise to these urgent challenges.

Kate Bennett, director of the EOC in Wales, said, “Our report shows that, while some progress has been made towards sex equality over the last 30 years, much remains to be done. “Women have still not got equal pay with men, experiencing widespread discrimination and paying a high penalty for having children in terms of career, pay and pensions. “Many women experience violence at home and feel unsafe in the community. Public services are failing to meet our needs. We’ve set out the gender equality challenges we face in Wales and are determined that the new commission will work tirelessly with others to remove the barriers that limit what people can do and what they can be in life. “Our aim is a fair, free and just society.”

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search for : Commission for Equality and Human Rights

Pro-family legislation sponsored by Congressman Lee Terry (R-NE) and Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) is expected to be introduced in both the House and the Senate today. The new act, entitled the Parents Tax Relief Act (PTRA), would grant tax relief and monetary incentive in various forms to families who chose to have one parent remain home as a care-giver to any children under the age of 6. The new act is similar to a previous act, also introduced by Terry and Brownback in the summer of 2005. The previous act was not approved because of lack of time before the end of the Congressional session. If the session expires before a bill is approved, the bill is considered dead and must be re-introduced in a new legislative session.

The proposed legislation would allow tax breaks to families with a stay-at-home parent, extend certain Social Security benefits to parents who leave the work force to remain at home with young children and make the current Child Tax Credit permanent and eliminate the Marriage Tax Penalty. The act would also provide incentive for businesses to provide telecommuting opportunities to employees that would prefer to work from home. It would also allow for financial incentives to owning a home-based business. Concerned Women for America?s Director of Government Relations and Public Policy, Shari Rendall commented on the proposed legislation saying, ?Parents have a tremendous amount of responsibility juggling work and family. The pressure to provide financially for a family often pulls both parents outside of the home to full-time jobs.?

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search for : Pro-family legislation, Child Tax Credit, Marriage Tax Penalty

What are you waiting for? You can do it. You can start a new career working from home even if you are in your fifties or sixties. Isn?t it time you left the rat race you have spent the better part of your life working in and started your own business from home? You don?t have to be a slave to a nine to five job. As a member of the new middle aged group (People in their fifties and sixties) you are entitled to exercise your option to start a new online work at home career right now.

Even if you are not great on the computer there are ready-made programs out there that will give you a free Website and a wide choice of affiliate products to sell. Maybe as you learn how to traverse the Internet you will develop your own information product to sell to others based on your knowledge and experience? The market for information products is huge and you can be part of it. Maybe you will take advantage of a special interest or hobby to sell something like fishing lures or baseball memorabilia? There are a lot of baseball fans out there that would like to be collectors. Whatever your special niche is, there is room on the Internet to find a market for your information and products, so start a new future today with a work at home opportunity. Don?t waste time. Your future is waiting. Arthur Levine is a freelance writer who concentrates on helping people in their fifties and sixties (Members of the New Middle Aged Group) find work at home opportunities. To find out more about special work at home opportunities please access www.youcan-workathome.com

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search for : working from home

If you’re like many entrepreneurs, your morning commute to the office is measured in seconds rather than miles. That’s because more than half of all small businesses are home-based, according to the federal Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy. To be sure, it’s one of the more cost-efficient ways to start a business, but it also can be quite challenging if you don’t lay the proper groundwork, say experts. “There needs to be some planning from a business point of view,” says Rosalind Resnick, president of Axxess Business Centers Inc., a small-business consulting company in Manhattan. “One of the problems a lot of people have is getting organized.”

Too often, home-based entrepreneurs set their prices too low, and profit margins suffer as a result, says Resnick, 47, a former business journalist turned home-based entrepreneur. Your pricing should factor in future growth, including the possibility of hiring an employee. “If you’re doing all the work yourself, you really haven’t started a business. All you’ve done is bought yourself a job,” she says. If your business is so competitive that you have to lowball your prices, it may not be worth getting into, she adds. The bottom line is you have to do your homework, experts say - the same as if you were opening a brick and mortar business. “If you really want to have a business, you have to act like a business,” adds Diane Pfadenhauer, 43, president and owner of Employment Practices Advisors, a human resources consulting company in Northport. “It doesn’t matter where you work out of.” Pfadenhauer, who is also a lawyer, started her home-based business three years ago. One of the first things she did was to incorporate the business, which helps an owner avoid personal liability in case of legal action.

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search for : entrepreneur, small businesses, home-based, Small Business Administration

The first ever International Women?s Day workshop for business women in the county is receiving a lot of attention ahead of the event next Thursday March 8. The workshop is entitled Achieving Your Potential and it takes place in Pontoon Bridge Hotel. The event is aimed at women in business at all levels. Speakers will include consultant and trainer Darina Loakman who was listed as one of the 50 Most Influential Women in Ireland (2006), Aideen Kane from GMTV and organisational consultant Annette Clancy. The workshop will be facilitated by Finola Howard, Marketing Consultant. The speakers will each develop one of three aspects of achieving potential - the issues, working from home and the working woman.

Mayo County Enterprise Board are strongly committed to supporting women in business and are founders of irishbusinesswomen.com, a virtual network and online discussion board with over a thousand members nationwide. Women in business at any level or stage are welcome to join, register for free on www.irishbusinesswomen.com, you?ll be glad you did. Pre-registration for Achieving Your Potential is essential. For booking or further details please contact Nicola Fitzpatrick at 094 9047597 or email nfitzpat@mayococo.ie. The nominal cost is ?20 per delegate and registration is at 6.30pm.

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search for : Achieving Your Potential, irishbusinesswomen.com

To find a job to work from home is a wonderful solution to think of and it has its wonderful advantages. Still a question that is worth asking here, did the person who thought of this idea examine all options available. If you want to work from home, why did you opt for a job to work from home? Why not establish your own home based business? I am not going to list the advantages of a home based business over finding a job to work from home. All what I am trying to do here is put the option in front of you in case you have not thought of it.

Having your own business in general must have crossed your mind, but you might have ignored it because of the traditional obstacles associated with such an idea. Well I have some good news for you.

If the idea of establishing your own business appeals to you more than having just another job, then here the facts:

1- The process of finding a legitimate job to work from home is just the same as finding ideas for working at home.

2- Both can be done online

3- The excitement of having your own home based business is greater than that of having a job to work from home.

4- A job is a job whether it was online, offline, at home or in an office. There is always a financial cap. You know it is not the same when it comes to having your own business.

5- Yet a job can be more secure in terms of earnings, unlike having your own business.

6- When you apply for a job, you are using the skills that you already possess, while when establishing your own business you will always learn other skills, especially if it was an online business. Read more »

search for : work from home, home based business

Recent Census data show that almost half of the nation’s 23 million businesses are operated out of the home. “We are running at about a 10 percent annual growth rate,” said Rudy Lewis, president of the National Association of Home Based Businesses, in Maryland. “I really couldn’t do everything I am doing if I had an office,” said Bean, who likes having few overhead business costs. “But what’s scary is how fast this has grown. This was supposed to be a side job to earn some extra money; now I am working on a Web site and brochures.”

Working out of the home requires self-discipline and motivation. And experts say it isn’t for everyone. “It is so easy to take a break and do the laundry or go play with the kids,” said Karen Graff, a consultant with the Small Business Development Center in Fresno. “And that’s fine, but it is also easy to lose focus. I tell people, if you are going to work out of your home, don’t do business in your jammies.” Computer consultant Tammy Sears admitted she worked better outside her home than in it. “Not only did I outgrow my space at home, but working at home also revealed a lack of discipline,” said Sears, founder of On-Site Computer Training in Fresno. “I would tell myself that I am going to get up at 8 a.m. and start working. But then I would start the laundry. I kept waffling back and forth. It didn’t work.” Many are making it work, especially women. Census figures show that 56 percent of home-based businesses are run by women, and organizations such as the Association of Home-Based Working Moms are helping to increase those numbers.

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search for : National Association of Home Based Businesses, Home-Based Working Moms

High-technology and competitive-staffing strategies have made at-home contact centers a reality. Now agents are able to log on and handle customer calls, emails, and chats in the convenience of their own home. Nonetheless, application of best practices is necessary for your contact center to enjoy ongoing success. While sending agents to work from home without direct physical supervision may be a large leap for some companies, many are already comfortable with the idea of distributed call centers. Home-based broadband and voice quality improvements in VoIP have enabled home-based contact centers.

Contact center supervisors traditionally coach, train, monitor, and tally agent KPIs, which vary from company to company but generally involve metrics, such as length of call, closing ratios, and first-call resolution. These activities must also apply for supervising remote agents. Several remote contact center solutions facilitate this real-time ability by allowing supervisors to listen in, whisper coach, and even view the screens of home-based agents. Establish a formal, rotating procedure for every supervisor who manages remote agents. This will help to compensate for the fact that they are not physically colocated. For example, you can reach out to them regularly with specific feedback, be it whisper coach or chat coach. It is also useful to post team KPI results regularly. These practices will help remote workers feel more connected and will contribute to better morale and productivity.

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search for : Home-based broadband, VoIP

Many of the home-based entrepreneurs opt to run their own companies in nontraditional ways. For most, home-based businesses are cheaper to operate, more flexible and easier to control. Recent Census data show that almost half of the nation’s 23 million businesses are operated out of the home. “We are running at about a 10 percent annual growth rate,” said Rudy Lewis, president of the National Association of Home Based Businesses, in Maryland. “I really couldn’t do everything I am doing if I had an office,” said Bean, who likes having few overhead business costs. “But what’s scary is how fast this has grown. This was supposed to be a side job to earn some extra money; now I am working on a Web site and brochures.”

Computer consultant Tammy Sears admitted she worked better outside her home than in it.

“Not only did I outgrow my space at home, but working at home also revealed a lack of discipline,” said Sears, founder of On-Site Computer Training in Fresno. “I would tell myself that I am going to get up at 8 a.m. and start working. But then I would start the laundry. I kept waffling back and forth. It didn’t work.” Many are making it work, especially women. Census figures show that 56 percent of home-based businesses are run by women, and organizations such as the Association of Home-Based Working Moms are helping to increase those numbers. Lesley Spencer Pyle, founder of the organization, said women are lured to home-based businesses because of the flexibility it provides new mothers and those looking to spend more time with their children. Pyle’s association and Web site (www.hbwm.com) provide a guide for how to get started and what women need to consider when trying to run a business from home. One of the biggest challenges for home-based-business owners are companies that grow faster than anticipated. Women sometimes end up trading a grueling office job for an equally time-consuming one at home.

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search for : home-based entrepreneurs, home-based businesses, National Association of Home Based Businesses

St. Petersburg, Florida-Donna Gonzalez wants to work at home for the sake of her daughter Leah. She recently posted her resume on websites like Career Builder.Com and quickly got a reply, ?They just need people who already had bank accounts set up, so we could cash the checks for them.? According to Donna, a company called Global Healthcare Inc.,out of London, sent her a contract asking her to cash checks and wire them the money. It was supposedly quicker than doing it overseas.

Donna was promised 10-percent of the money cashed, ?It looked legitimate I mean I went to paralegal school and I knew some contractual law and so the contract looked legitimate, but it wasn’t evidentially.? After Donna cashed a check from a “so called” customer and wired the company more than 25-hundred dollars,she later found out the check was fake and she was the one who was stuck paying, ?I was so devastated I cried so hard.? Sgt. Kevin Smith of the St. Petersburg Police Department says, he gets calls like this one at least two times a week, ?It’s heartbreaking because you really hate to see people out there trying to work, trying to sell something to be taken advantage of.? Sgt. Kevin Smith says websites like Career Builder.Com are safe, but people need to be more aware of who they’re dealing with, ?Unfortunately anybody has a right to log in and look at those resumes so you really don’t know who’s actually offering you a job.?

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search for : paralegal school, St. Petersburg Police Department

Work Wise Week 2007 has been announced and this year will run from Wednesday May 16 to Tuesday May 22, and will include National Work from Home Day on Friday May 18. Work Wise UK is a national not-for-profit initiative to promote ?smarter working? practices such as flexible, remote and mobile working, and working from home.

It is supported by a number of leading organisations including the CBI, TUC, British Chambers of Commerce, BT and Transport for London. The objective is for half the working population, some 14 million workers, to have had the opportunity to work smarter by 2011.

In 2006, Work Wise Week, including National Work from Home Day, was a huge success, prompting over 85 television and radio interviews, and upwards of 500 articles and news stories. This year media interest is expected to be even stronger.

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