Don’t Let Your Dream Business Turn Into a Nightmare is a fresh, funny and ferociously honest account of one man’s attempt to realize his dream – the dream of creating one of the first day spas for men in the world.
Do you think you have a good idea for starting your own small business?
Are you thinking of launching your own small business with someone else’s money?
Don’t!
Not until you read Don’t Let Your Dream Business Turn Into a Nightmare.
What People Are Saying About Don’t Let Your Dream Business Turn Into a Nightmare:
(Don’t Let Your Dream Business Turn Into a Nightmare) describes the challenges faced by entrepreneur Alan Stransman as he starts up a men’s-only spa with no money, no business experience and no team. It provides students a real-life opportunity to discuss the needed ingredients for business success: an attractive idea; a qualified team; a compelling plan and adequare funding. Stransman arguably encounters challenges on each of these four fronts. This case is valuable reading and extremely useful for facilitating real-world discussion of all of these critical issues.
Ron Close
Executive Entrepreneur-in-Residence
The Richard Ivey School of Business
University of Western Ontario
Alan Stransman’s book provides an entertaining cautionary tale for all those with dreams of turning an entrepreneurial idea into reality some day. The huge surge of interest in entrepreneurship that accompanied the dot-com boom in the late 1990′s produced a whole generation of mainly young people , who wanted to drop whatever it was they were doing in order to launch a start-up. The equally huge rate of dot-com failures should have been enough to demonstrate that starting a new business is fraught with pitfalls, but somehow, that message didn’t seem to get through as well as it might have done. Alan’s book is, thus, a timely reminder to all would-be entrepreneurs that the road to realizing entrepreneurial dreams is by no means an easy one.
Patrick Turner
Affiliate Professor of Entrepreneurship
INSEAD Asia Campus
Alan’s book is a true “hands-on” account of a real business experience. The reader is in Alan’s shoes to get an experiential trip, warts and all. If you are thinking of starting your own business and want to get a feel for another side of the coin, be sure to include Alan’s book in your research.
Donald Prescott
Director, The Eric Douglass Centre for Entrepreneurial Studies
Faculty of Management
Royal Roads University
The students truly enjoyed the experience of having you come to the classroom, the exercise, analyzing your book and creating the feasibility study. What was most enjoyable, and what I appreciate the most, was the time and effort you took to attend the night of presentations. The students so appreciated the fact that you were there for questions and input. These students are in their 3rd and 4th year, so the ability to bring the “real” world to their studies was a great experience….It was your personal touch, the pressure of having the author in attendance that added such a thrill and challenge and made the assignment such a great experience.
Professor Cammie Jaquays
Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario
I have used Alan Stransman’s book Don’t Let Your Dream Business Turn into a Nightmare in my business and law classes with great success. The book challenges students to analyze the reasons for the business failure and measure those reasons against traditional business model concepts, especially the notion of using Other People’s Money. It stimulates great discussion amongst the students.
Alan Franklin, JD LLB LLM
Canadian Business College
I couldn’t put it down! From the first page I wanted to know what happened and how it turned out. It’s been a long time since a book has captured my attention to this degree. Alan has put the reader’s feet in his shoes and allowed us the privilege of feeling his pain. I was just as exhausted as he was as I read the daily challenges he faced and seemed to suffer the same arrows when learning his tragedies.
Skip Williams
Vice-President Spa Development Resources & Development
Author of “The Reluctant Spa Director and the Mission Dream”
If you have ever thought of starting your own business, Alan Stransman’s book Don’t Let Your Dream Business Turn Into a Nightmare is a MUST read. A cautionary tale, indeed.
Anne Dimon
Publisher/Editor
http://www.traveltowellness.com
Just read your book cover-to-cover. I’ve got a small venture running in my basement – it’s a REALLY GREAT IDEA. There’s an angel-finance guy pushing me to accept some investors and build a company. He’s gor $500k lined up for me, ready to go. I drafted and redrafted a business plan 7 times before he was happy enough with it to present it to them – and each time it got better looking. Of course, we are still figuring out who our market is and what our product is, but that’s okay, everyone does that. But now that I’ve read your book, Hmmm, I realize that I have a REALLY GREAT IDEA and a really wrong business plan. Add money and investors looking for fast results, that’s a recipe for disaster. I’ve put the finance on hold, will keep running on a shoestring until I learn the business. Thanks for a really great book. It probably SAVED MY LIFE.
Tom Berend
Software Developer/Entrepreneur
(More testimonials inside)