Another story was told to me that I think will resonate with a lot of small business owners out there. It's the classic story of 'keeping your day job' and how it affects your dream company from growing. In a nutshell, a good friend of mine slowly developed his company for years while working. He simply was too afraid of not being able to financially support himself working on the venture full-time (if he had Indinero back then, he would know exactly how much he had and wouldn't have to worry! :). The moment he eventually did work full-time, a competitor had emerged and captured a large majority of the market because they were entirely committed to their growth. A good moral of this story could be to either go big or go home, but perhaps the strategy of ensuring financial stability and moving slowly may work in the long run. It's all a matter of opinion. Ultimately, it's important to know your cash and still innovate quickly! (Oops! This was supposed to post yesterday, never trust Wordpress' scheduling feature to itself!)

Hey everyone! So, it's small business horror story time.

This time it's not going to be anonymous. I'm going to give you a story from our internshipIN days.  It's a story many startups or even some small businesses know very well.

So, when we first received our intenshipIN TechCrunch article write-up last year, guess what happened?

(drumroll) Our servers crashed!! Gasp! Shock! The horror! See, there is such thing as too much of a good thing, but regardless it's a good place to be.

This was a quick one, but thanks for checking it out!  Got a horror story? Submit it at smallbizhorror@indinero.com. Don’t worry, you won’t be embarrassed. It’s all anonymous (except for this one).

Hey everyone, as promised here's the first installment of our small business horror series. I reached out to an old friend and he provided me with the following story, although not directly finance related - it's good enough to scare you. He described it to me verbally, so here's how it went: "We just opened a really funky snack store close to a college campus. I wanted to introduce the store to the students and do it in a 'cool' way. A friend suggested I graffiti one wall of the store. He figured college students were into that kind of thing and it was the vibe I wanted to give off. It sounded good enough, so I put up a couple of Craigslist ads, found a graffiti artist and asked him to stop by. When he arrived, he said he had done live shows before and thought a live show of him graffiting the wall would help draw in customers. I agreed and we set a date. When the grand opening day arrived, I was nervous and excited. The artist arrived and immediately got to work while I invited students to come inside and join us. But apparently, graffiti fumes are toxic and my store wasn't organized correctly for great circulation. Not one student could come inside. The worst part is no one ever forgot about that day and always figured it was dangerous to enter, despite several other marketing attempts." ...and there you have it. Small business horror! The moral of the story here is don't let toxic fumes be how your customers remember you! Have you asked your customers their first impressions of your brand? What was your first impression of Indinero? Take some time to not stink at the beginning. Well, thanks for checking it out! Got a horror story? Submit it at smallbizhorror@indinero.com. Don't worry, you won't be embarrassed. It's all anonymous.

Forget Freddy Krueger films, the Indinero Horror series will leave you rocking yourself with your hands over your eyes. The fear won't come from fake blood or corny sweaters. It will come from real small business finance stories that could happen to anyone. Every Wednesday, we will be give you a horror story sent in from the Indinero community. The stories will be kept anonymous just to save the storyteller from reliving the terror. If you do get scared, don't worry. We know plenty of financial remedies so your fear won't last long! Ready to share your story with the masses (anonymously, of course)? Send your financial horror story to smallbizhorror@indinero.com and we will take care of the rest.