The vast majority of Rhode Island’s enterprises are small businesses, with fewer than 100 employees. It is no exaggeration to say that as they go, so goes Rhode Island.
For that reason alone, PBN’s weekly Main Street page, which features companies that fit that profile, is a window on success stories that can serve as examples of how to thrive even as many are doing exactly the opposite.
This week’s Main Street subject, Hunt Yachts, is not just an uplifting story about a company with 51 employees that continues to come out with new products. Nor is it just about a company that was founded in Massachusetts and when it needed to expand, moved to Rhode Island seven years ago and has done quite well since.
Rather, it is a story about how a company that was doing well with building yachts saw a business opportunity in the related repair business, which in turn led to storage, service, brokering and reselling. Hunt now presents a business model that is able to draw on related revenue streams that produce a more consistent cash flow, no matter the state of the economy. And that is a business lesson we all could stand to internalize. •