Not everyone wants to save the parks. In California, voters soundly defeated a measure that, for the cost of a few lattes, would have funded the state parks and granted everyone free access. Why? Because many folks don’t use the parks and they think that users should pay. They also have a feeling of entitlement […]

We play a game every morning at our house. It’s called “Find the Good News!” When we read the news of the day over breakfast, we find and share only the stories that are helpful, fun, and positive. We look for stories of success, solutions, and humanitarianism. Admittedly, some days it’s a real challenge. One […]

WHAT DOES BUSINESS AND BAREFOOT HAVE TO DO WITH WINE? 18 JUNE, 2014  LEAVE A COMMENT Today we are talking about Wine … Recently I had the opportunity to sit down with Michael Houlihan and Bonnie Harvey, founders of Barefoot, America’s number #1 wine brand, during Small Business Week presented by the Mobile Area Chamber of […]

Barefoot Wine Founders Employ Zone Recording Technology to Record Audio for Success Magazine Interview Houlihan and Harvey co-authored the New York Times Bestselling Business Paperback, “The Barefoot Spirit: How Hardship, Hustle, and Heart Built America’s #1 Wine Brand.” From what originated as a start-up in their laundry room in 1986, has since become a nationwide bestselling […]

We’ve always been hikers and love to discover the true natural environment wherever we travel. We can’t wait get away from the cities and man-made “improvements” and venture off into the real world – on foot! Perhaps that is why we have always been conservationists at heart and why we have a special love for […]

Should we be teaching the mindset necessary for successful entrepreneurship beginning much earlier than college? By postponing the consideration of self-employment until after high school are educational institutions actually discouraging their students from entrepreneurial thinking? Earlier this week we were honored to be keynote speakers at the 2014 International Council on Small Business – World […]

IF MICHAEL Houlihan had followed the advice of his Irish-born grandparents he would have settled for a secure, pensionable job and a fairly comfortable lifestyle – and there’s a chance we would not be sipping the near nine million cases of wine sold in Ireland each year. Luckily, for him and our taste buds, he […]

  Michael was interviewed on The Pat Kenny show while in Dublin, Ireland. To listen to the interview, please follow the links below.   The Pat Kenny Show Part 1 (Interview starts at 54:56) The Pat Kenny Show Part 2 (Rest of the interview goes until 04:43)

The more your boss trusts you, the faster you become indispensable. They want to rely on you to do your job right, and that means relatively free of errors. Sure, there are bosses that want to micromanage everything you do. Those bosses are actually preventing their people from ever becoming self-reliant. We are not talking […]