Running a company is, in the best sense, a labour of love.
But what happens when couples go into business together? Can it be too much of a good thing?
These three couples took the entrepreneurial leap of faith, and on the occasion of Valentine’s Day, they talked about what they learned from the experience.
Serene Gebara and Omar Kamal: Zenporium
Four months ago, Ms. Gebara and Mr. Kamal opened Zenporium, a furnishings store in Toronto that specializes in exotic Asian furniture made from reclaimed wood. The seeds for the business were sown while the couple were on their honeymoon in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand in December, 2009.
Ms. Gebara was the human resources manager with a furniture company, and she left the job to start Zenporium, while Mr. Kamal worked in insurance, a position he continues to hold.
“We both had a passion for furniture and what we wanted to do was find a few pieces for ourselves,” Mr. Kamal says. “We’d seen some of these organic, reclaimed wood pieces before we went on the trip, so we knew we’d bring some back.”
After almost six weeks in Southeast Asia, they fell in love with the style and were convinced they could open their own store. They began to build contacts with manufacturers and distributors – returning to Toronto with a 40-foot container filled to the brim.
“We had discussed (the possibility of starting a business) but did not expect how good our outcome would be and how quickly we’d get things moving,” Ms. Gebara says.
The couple had to start from scratch, only later learning the niceties of setting up a business: registration, incorporation, and finding retail space.
“Ninety per cent of what we were doing was for the first time,” Mr. Kamal says.
The story behind the formation of the company did not charm everyone. “People told us ‘you should be really careful, it’s not a good idea to start a business with your partner.’ Really, we were very excited about it, not knowing what to expect. We’re both pretty hard workers,” Ms. Gebara says.
The couple have been pleasantly surprised so far, she adds. “What has been nice about this whole process is that we’ve come to respect each other a lot more. We’ve learned so much about each other.”
Ms. Gebara says she discovered her husband has the gift of conversation no matter what the situation, and Mr. Kamal says the challenges in pulling Zenporium together has given him the satisfaction of knowing that the pair can tackle any of life’s problems together.
“There have been difficult challenges in the past year related to the business, and we got through them. I look at that experience and think we could probably just get through anything in our personal lives.”
David and Stephanie Ciccarelli: Voices.com
Voices.com has grown from a “kitchen table” business, when it was founded eight years ago, into a multimillion-dollar company with 15 staff and 50,000 clients, located at the University of Western Ontario’s research park in London, Ont.
The company creates online connections for voice actors from around the world, introducing them to business opportunities for podcasting, video and film voiceovers, and translations.
Originally an audio engineer with a recording studio, Mr. Ciccarelli began working with Ms. Ciccarelli – then a music student who needed to record her singing for a university course – after her mother spotted a story on Mr. Ciccarelli’s company in a local newspaper.
“It started as a working relationship, and Stephanie likes to say that then it got romantic. We got married, had three kids, and all that good stuff,” Mr. Ciccarelli explains.
