Million-Dollar Businesses You've Never Heard Of

Read this before you toss your nutty business idea aside.

While visiting Las Vegas in 2004, auto-dealership fleet manager Rico Elmore decided he needed some stylish sunglasses for his honeymoon. Elmore is six-foot-three, weighs 300-pounds and has a head to match, so finding shades that fit proved a struggle.

I must have tried on 300 pairs and literally found nothing that fit," recalls Elmore, 36. "I walked out and said, 'This is ridiculous.' I decided to make sunglasses for people like me with fat heads." Elmore's company, Fatheadz, now sells "full-figure" glasses, for $28 to $54 a pair, and is on track to hit $2 million in sales this year--up from $700,000 in 2009.

Have a nutty business idea and need some inspiration to pull it off? We went looking for small companies that generate at least $1 million in annual revenue in unexpected ways. Look hard enough and they are legion.

Like many entrepreneurs, Elmore had a good idea but needed a little luck, too. Back in Brownsburg, Ind., after his honeymoon, he worked up a basic design for his super-wide specs. He hired a product-engineering company to make the molds and a contract manufacturer to crank out the frames and temple arms; he assembled the glasses at home during the evenings after work. Elmore tried patenting his discovery, but lawyers told him he could only patent the design of the glasses, not their size. Sales were a trickle.

Luck struck about a year later when an Indianapolis Star reporter called to interview Elmore about his friend, Rupert Boneham, the gentle-giant star of CBS' Survivor series. She mentioned Fatheadz in the article.

The ripples eventually reached a top Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT - News) executive, who ordered 300 pairs in three styles as a trial run. By 2008 Elmore's glasses were in 3,000 Wal-Marts and Sam's Club stores. Elmore also happened to know an equipment manager with the Indianapolis Colts; soon the players were sporting Fatheadz rims. (Elmore has no promotional deal with the NFL, but he says it's on his to-do list.) Now with a full-time staff of 10, Elmore plans to launch a new line for women--under a different name, of course.

Here are a few more highlights from our search for million-dollar businesses you've never heard of:

Geese Police

Courtesy of Geese Police

Howell, N.J.
Entrepreneur: Dave Marcks
Product/Service: Geese abatement using collies
Start Date: 1987
Startup Costs: About $3,000
Revenue: Estimated $2.5 million in 2010
Every Roadrunner has his Wile E. Coyote, and for golf-course superintendent Marcks, geese were the mortal enemy. Their incessant droppings vexed golfers and "fowled" water hazards, and he couldn't get rid of them. Then he discovered that border collies--an intelligent and persistent dog breed--are great at banishing the big birds for good. His elite force now includes 33 animals.

Texas Driving Experience

Courtesy of Texas Driving Experience

Ft. Worth, Texas
Entrepreneur: Dawn Stokes
Product/Service: High-performance driving lessons and retreats
Start Date: 2004
Startup Costs: About $500,000
Revenue: Estimated $1.8 million in 2010
Stokes never outgrew the driving thrills she got from her first car--a '63 Chevrolet Monza Corvair convertible--and she knew she had plenty of suppressed company. So the medical-products saleswoman cashed in her 401(k) to buy 10 Corvettes and start a racing school, hosted at local tracks. Stokes found a mother lode in the corporate-team-building market. "It fits well with sales vernacular," she says--as in, "racing toward the end of the year."

Mabel's Labels

Courtesy of Mabel's Labels

Hamilton, Ontario
Entrepreneur: Julie Cole
Product/Service: Personalized, permanent labels for kids' stuff.
Start Date: 2002
Startup Costs: About $10,000
Revenue: $4 million in 2009
Moms hate it when their kids lose jackets at school or mix up sippy cups at play dates. Four Canadian career Moms hit upon a solution: durable, kid-proof labels. It took years to certify that their products were dishwasher- and microwave-safe. Now the line includes shoe labels, metal bag tags, ID wristbands and Allergy Alerts labels.

Stave Puzzles

Courtesy of Stave Puzzles

Norwich, Vt.
Entrepreneur: Steve Richardson
Product/Service: Hand-made wooden jigsaw puzzles.
Start Date: 1974
Startup Costs: About $5,000.
Revenue: $2.5 million in 2009
Ranging in price from $125 to $5,000, these puzzles are made of cherry wood, covered with a dry-mounted image drawn by one of 100 licensed artists, and individually hand-cut into as many as 2,500 pieces. Bill Gates has one, and Barbara Bush gave another as a gift to Queen Elizabeth. "We try to make them hard to put together," said Richardson, 71, who calls himself the company's chief tormentor.

PetRelocation.com

Courtesy of PetRelocation.com

Austin, Texas
Entrepreneur: Kevin O'Brien and Angie O'Brien
Product/Service: Pet travel
Start Date: 2004
Startup Costs: $97,000
Revenue: Estimated $4 million in 2010
This husband-and-wife team sold a doggy day-care business to get into the pet-moving game. Initial investments included a new van, Google ads, a website and a $300 membership to IPATA, an international trade association of animal handlers. The couple claims it can move any live animal, anywhere around the world--say, a dog from Seattle to Shanghai, mole rats from South Africa to San Antonio and dart frogs from Switzerland to the U.S. It's a turn-key service, covering airline bookings, blood tests, vet check-ups, logistics, customs and quarantine.

BlackSocks

Courtesy of BlackSocks

Zürich, Switzerland
Entrepreneur: Samuel Liechti
Product/Service: Sock subscriptions
Start Date: 1999
Startup Costs: $30,000
Revenue: $5 million in 2009
BlackSocks will ship you a batch of Italian-made, knee-high or calf-length cotton or cashmere/silk dress socks, automatically, several times a year, starting at $89 for nine pairs. Each new "sockscriber" receives a calculation of how much time he will save by not making sock purchases: about 12 hours every year, or three weeks in the lifetime of an average Swiss male, expected to reach age 82. Liechti brought his "sock-scription" service to the U.S. in 2005. Two years later, BlackSocks began selling subscriptions for underwear. Liechti now boasts 60,000 active customers in 74 countries. BlackSocks opened a New York office last year.

Sky Zone

Courtesy of Sky Zone

Las Vegas
Entrepreneur: Rick Platt
Product/Service: Arenas covered with trampolines
Start Date: 2009
Startup Costs: About $2 million
Revenue: $3 million-plus in 2009
Cover five of the six sides of a gymnasium-size room with seamless trampolines and what do you get? People bouncing off the walls with excitement. Platt's three Sky Zones are hives of birthday parties, corporate events, three-dimensional dodge ball tournaments and rabid trampoliners willing to pay up to $12 an hour. He aims to begin franchising in 2011. "It was a wild bet," admits Platt, 60, a former scrap-metal broker. "Some people thought the idea was ridiculous. I thought if I could pull it off, I would have something unique."

DNA 11

Courtesy of DNA 11

Ottawa, Ontario
Entrepreneurs: Adrian Salamunovic and Nazim Ahmed
Product/Service: DNA artwork
Start Date: 2005
Start-up Costs: $2,000
Revenue: $1.4 million in 2009
Best friends Salamunovic and Ahmed blend science and medicine with modern art. With a simple cheek swab, they collect enough organic matter to create an image of human DNA using equipment similar to the machines Ahmed used to sell for a Canadian biotech firm. After selling a few prints to family and friends, the twosome was invited to showcase their work at an Absolut Vodka-sponsored party in Ottawa's SOHO neighborhood. An 8"x10" mini-DNA portrait goes for $200, while a 36"x54" wall canvas garners $1,300. The Museum of Modern Art features DNA 11 art in its museum stores in New York and Tokyo.

Murray Associates

Courtesy of Murray Associates

Oldwick, N.J.
Entrepreneur: Kevin D. Murray
Product/Service: Eavesdropping detection and counterespionage
Start Date: 1978
Startup Costs: $5,000
Revenue in 2009: $760,000
Ever since taking a part-time job manning surveillance equipment for the Dennis Port, Mass., police department, Kevin Murray has been a spy buster. Businesses and governments hire him to find hidden bugs and such, which he does using sensitive thermal-imaging equipment (which picks up the heat given off by hidden sensors) to lots of plain old looking around. Murray handles about 125 cases per year, typically charging between $7,000 and $8,000 per day of inspection. Revenue dipped below $1 million in 2009 as Wall Street cut back on its anti-snooping efforts, but things are looking up this year.

The Fiero Store

Courtesy of The Fiero Store

Stafford Springs, Conn.
Entrepreneur: Matthew Hartzog.
Product/Service: Parts and accessories for the Pontiac Fiero
Start Date: 1991
Start-up Costs: $5,000
Revenue: $2 million in 2009
Hartzog spent his teenage summers and school breaks working for his stepfather selling parts and accessories for GM Opels. But the long-defunct, two-seat, mid-engine Fiero was where his heart lay. Approximately 370,000 Fieros rolled off the lines between 1984 and 1988 before Pontiac stopped producing the car; less than 75,000 are currently registered in the U.S. Fanatics make great customers.

11 Ways to Hurt Your Career

While most career advice focuses on how to succeed, we can all learn valuable lessons by dissecting career failure as well. Workplace experts offer insights into some of the top ways workers undermine their own careers and jeopardize their career development.   

1. Not Taking Your Education Seriously

If you party too much in college and end up with a run-of-the-mill 2.5 GPA, you’ll be passed over for the best entry-level jobs, says New York City-based executive recruiter and coach Brian Drum of Drum Associates. Not finishing your master’s degree is another way to hurt your career development goals, adds Anne Angerman, a career coach with Denver-based Career Matters.

2. Not Having a Plan

In the current poor job market, you may have defaulted into a career you aren’t crazy about. That’s OK, as long as you develop career plans to get where you want to be. “Think of every job you take as a stepping-stone to your next job,” Drum advises.

3. Lying

You’ll lose professional credibility in a hurry if you lie, from exaggerating on your resume to getting caught fibbing on Facebook. “If someone calls in sick to work and then that evening posts a photo on Facebook of their extra day vacationing in Cabo San Lucas, that’s a big problem,” says corporate etiquette specialist Diane Gottsman of the Protocol School of Texas in San Antonio.

4. Sullying Your Reputation on Facebook or Twitter

Social media can harm your reputation in other ways, too. Personal posts and tweets from work -- when you’re supposed to be doing your job -- can tag you as a slacker. And the content of your posts or tweets can come back to haunt you as well -- you never know who might stumble upon those bachelor-party photos. “You need to assume that every boss and potential employer knows how to use Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, and post from the standpoint that everyone is watching even if in reality they’re not,” Gottsman says.

5. Not Respecting Professional Boundaries

Sharing TMI about your personal life with colleagues is unprofessional. “Your coworkers don’t want to hear about your fights with your husband,” Angerman says. On the other hand, if you’re ultraprivate and work with a chatty group, join the conversations occasionally so coworkers don’t resent you.

6. Gossiping, Slandering, Excessively Criticizing

If you publicly bash fellow employees, the boss, the board of directors or even your competitors, you’ll be perceived as negative at best and a troublemaker at worst. The ramifications can be broad and long term, Gottsman says. “Industries are tight,” she says. “You don’t want to be the one who started that rumor about the head of your industry.” As far as bad-mouthing competitors -- what if your company merges with a competitor, or you want to work for one someday?

7. Carrying on an Inappropriate Relationship with Your Boss

Never a good idea, but an especially bad one if your boss is married. “When you get involved in a drama or in something unethical that can be brought out in the open, you’re asking for trouble,” Gottsman says.

8. Not Controlling Your Alcohol Intake or Libido

Getting drunk at the office party or on a business trip damages your credibility. Ditto a romantic, ahem, “indiscretion” that your colleagues know about.

9. Job-Hopping Just for the Money

Job-hopping -- in moderation -- may not automatically disqualify you from a position. “But it gets to the point -- like if you have seven or eight jobs by the time you’re 35 -- that employers are not going to want to invest in you,” Drum says. Also, if you have leadership aspirations, keep in mind that the top dogs of many large corporations have been with those organizations for long periods, he says. Additionally, many companies have “last in, first out” layoff policies, which could leave you out of a job if you never stick around long enough to build tenure anywhere.

10. Losing Touch with References
You’ll kick yourself later if you leave a job without collecting personal contact information from colleagues who can serve as professional references for you in the future. “If you were forced to leave a job and you can’t ask your boss for a reference, hopefully you’ve built up some rapport with a colleague and can ask them,” Angerman says.

11. Leaving a Job on Bad Terms

Don’t become a lame duck when you’ve got one foot out the door, Drum says. “The employer only remembers about the last five minutes you were there,” he says. Give proper notice and don’t leave a mess behind. And by all means, do not make a huge dramatic production of it when you quit, complete with cursing, slandering and throwing things, Gottsman advises. “It’s very difficult to get another job when you’ve left destruction in your wake,” she says.

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By Megan Malugani, Monster Contributing Writer