In 1950, my Grandpa moved from his childhood hometown of Pittsburgh, PA to Wilmington, NC in search of a career. He was a trained optometrist who was seeking to open a new practice, yet he realized that his hometown already had its fill of optometrists and he needed to find a new home for his practice. He had a few characteristics of the ideal
My grandpa opened a practice and started to connect with people around town. Being Jewish, he already had an in, yet there were not many Jews in Wilmington in the 50’s. Though he did meet another local Jewish doctor in his first month of his new life, who told him about the Sunday morning group. This group, as I have heard it called multiple times, was a group of 10-20 local business owners and entrepreneurs. This group sat around at a local restaurant and talked shop. They would discuss new business opportunities, argue about business models and markets, think about new ideas and concepts, and talk about the news. One of the most valuable parts of the group though was the mentorship. My grandpa would tell me that when he started his practice he knew nothing about building permits, registering a business, or running a company, yet through this group he had an outlet to ask seasoned business owners his questions and accelerate his learning.
After hearing this story a few times, I was convinced that there had to be something similar to this group here in Chicago. I knew that there were incubators, accelerators, and meetups that you could go to and learn from, but I was looking for something more similar to “the group” that I had heard about so many time before.
During my first year in Chicago, I searched and searched but was coming up empty handed. I had even thrown the idea around to create something like this with a few other founders from my co-working space, but didn’t really have the time to do it. I put the search on the backburner so that I could focus on my company, yet I always kept the hope that the Chicago version of “the group” was out there.
Then last week after a pitch to 45 angel investors, one of the investors came up to me afterwards to ask me a few follow up questions. We had a great chat and had connected because he was also Jewish. As conversation was ending, he extended an offer to join him and a few others at a Sunday morning meeting for entrepreneurs to talk shop and get free advice.
I was ecstatic!! This sounded like exactly what I was looking for. I asked him for more information. He then said, “It’s called The Main Street Entrepreneurs and consists of about 30 people who come to the Sunday morning meeting…it starts at 8:30am and goes until 10:30am. Someone presents their business they are working on and a specific challenge they are encountering. Then the group gets to ask questions and discuss solutions.”
This was it! I knew it existed, I just needed to find the right people. It sounded like the perfect way to accelerate my learning, a great place to meet mentors, and gain honest feedback with no strings attached.
Sunday morning couldn’t come any faster. I was eagerly looking forward to the meeting, besides the fact of waking up early on a Sunday morning. When I walked in, I was greeted by the person who had invited me. He said, “Good to see you. Right this way.”
I walked into a square conference room with tables lined up in the shape of a U and chairs on the outside of the tables. In the middle of the tables was a smaller circle table with a big pile of clip on nametags. I asked someone standing near the table about all the nametags, and he replied, “Oh! Those are all the nametags of people who had ever attended the meeting.” On that same table there was a square stone plaque standing up, that measured about 1 foot by 1 foot. It looked a little odd sitting there and I couldn’t see the front of it until I sat down.
I quickly made a name tag, scanned the room to see if I knew anyone (the answer was no) and then took a seat. It was exciting to see people flow into the room, in total about 30 people were there and I anxious to meet all of them. There were some older, white haired men and some middle-aged women, yet it was clear that I was the youngest in the room.
As I was sitting down, I looked at that plaque. The plaque said,
“In memory of Joe Levi
For inspiration and learning.
To further entrepreneurship and success.”
I knew just then that this group was the real deal and that I was going to really enjoy this.
The organizer said it’s time to get started. I was impressed with the order and structure that the meeting began in. The organizer welcomed everyone, then each person introduced themselves (even though, as I later learned, 90% of the people already knew each other and were regulars). After introductions, the presenter was there to tell the group about his early stage business and the challenges he was having. He started by telling a story about how he lost his job in real estate at the start of the recession of 2008, then his wife lost her job, and the next week of all of this they had their first child. This was the start to a good story, I along with the group was emotionally invested now to hear more. He continued to explain how he picked himself up by starting to buy, flip, and sell homes. In the process, he discovered a big challenge for buyers who wanted a home in a good school district. At the time, there was no easy way to search for a home that was in a specific school district that fit the buyer’s specifications. Thus, he created his company. He was coming to the group to ask for advice on how to scale the company.
At the end of his pitch, it was time for the group to ask questions and for the presenter to take notes of the feedback. This process was again structured, there was an order to the Q&A. The first questions allowed were around clarity of the business and value proposition, then people were allowed to share observations of the company, and finally solutions to the challenge outlined. The other interesting part of the Q&A, was that when an audience member had a question, they would raise their hand, then the organizer would note it down and go down the list of people. With this structure, everyone in the room remained focused on the content and discussion of the business, it made so much sense to me in reflection.
At the end of the meeting, the presenter shared some final thoughts and graciously thanked everyone for their feedback. There are not many environments or groups where you can access seasoned business leaders and for free pick their brain about your business. With the presentation and Q&A done, the meeting was “officially” over. Yet almost everyone stayed and rose from their chairs to talk to each other. As I walked around, I heard people continuing the discussion or questing details of each other’s questions that were raised. This part of the meeting further validated that the people in the room were my people, people who love entrepreneurship as much as I do, and this was “my group.”
My first experience at the Sunday morning business meeting was outstanding. It was exactly what my grandpa had been talking about for all those years, when he told me stories about “the group”.
Before I left the meeting, I had asked the person who invited me, “How many of the attendees were new vs regulars?” He replied, “about 90% are regulars and 10% are newbies.” This further excited me and made me think that I could become a regular. On the way home, I decided that I am going to try and make this a habit of mine, to attend every Sunday morning meeting and maybe one day I can even present my company to the group.