Adventures in Raising a Business from Infancy to Profitability

As students, we sit in class scribing notes and absorbing information, wondering when all this learning will be put to the test. We work. We study. We socialize. We live. But at the end of the day we worry. We worry about the next test, the next paper, the next opportunity we will have to study and write because, like all adults, we need jobs, we need money. We need money for books, for rent, for food, and for gas, for laptops and iPods, for anything that we need, or even just want. When Michael Kaloutas started his business back in 2002 he had one thing in mind: money. Then, amidst a boom in the housing market, and a drastic decline in travel during the aftermath of September 11, classroom tools and real-life experience laid the foundation for what people in the world of business refer to as an Entrepreneurial Seizure. His life-long experience in the painting business had dug the hole, and the notebooks filled with endless pages of business information poured the cement. All it took was a spark of creative innovation, and out came SEAL-A-DECK.

Growing up under the apprenticeship of his father, a now retired master painter, Kaloutas watched how the industry had changed over nearly a two decade span, and during the spring of 2002, he began to notice a trend. The outdoor-living market was budding because people were investing more in their homes. The growth was due mostly to skyrocketing home values, and partially because people were traveling less—an impact of 9/11. People had become accustomed to the standard 10 x12 decks, but with this outdoor-living boom people were building custom decks with more ornate, detail-oriented designs with exotic woods like mahogany and cedar.

While observing this market explosion, he noticed that painters were treating outdoor living spaces as an afterthought. Because this new trend of deck was far more complex than its lackluster predecessor, the typical treatments were insufficient for what the current painters in the industry had to offer. Years of watching his father and brother building the family business from scratch had instilled in him the ability to recognize an opportunity when it presented itself. He immediately snatched at that opportunity.

As a child, Kaloutas had heard the word "entrepreneur" tossed around. He had no idea what it meant at the time, other than that it sounded exciting and fun. It wasn't until he was a student here at Salem State that he fully understood what it meant to be an entrepreneur. It was in a finance class that he was first exposed to the scope and magnitude of entrepreneurism.

"We were doing a case study on Expedia and I noticed how they and other companies were using technology to better serve the costumer," he said. "All of a sudden consumers could do things, make purchases, and travel arrangements when it was convenient for them.

Kaloutas said that was the early stage in the development of the Instant Quote Tool for his future website.

Like all entrepreneurs, Kaloutas, had a vision of a successful company with innovative ideas applied to real-world practical business tactics. It would come in due time, but first he had another problem: balancing schoolwork and handling a business that boomed from the get-go. When I asked him what the most difficult thing was about starting a new business as a college student, he said,  "It took a lot of hard work. There were a lot of speed-bumps in the beginning.

"For me the most challenging thing was time management." Koulas continued. "One thing my father and brother had was time. That was a luxury I didn't have.

"I remember reading about a book in one of my classes called The E-Myth Revisited," he said. "It helped with the whole time-management issue, and that was great, but in the long run it really helped with developing systems."

I asked him if his definition of an entrepreneur had changed since his childhood and since his years at Salem State.

"Yes," he said. "Emphatically, and once again, yes. Being an entrepreneur is a little more than exciting and fun."

Since 2005, SEAL-A-DECK's business volume has double annually. The company quickly morphed from a one-man show into one man managing nearly half a dozen crews spread across the greater Boston area. What started out as a broke college student's means for financial survival soon became a multi-dimensional business that now stains close to 750 decks annually.

Michael Kaloutas is proof that college students have hope for a successful future. He is also proof that it takes more than just book knowledge and innovative ideas to succeed. What it takes is drive, determination, hard work, and most importantly, the ability to roll with the punches, the grandiose successes, and the inevitable speed bumps that occur along the path through the infancy of a young business being run by an equally young man.