The Year in Review: 2008

2008 felt like a huge success to us Tumbleweeders; we survived. When I first joined Tumbleweed in 2007, I did so because I loved the idea. I knew others loved it, too. But could it really be a business? In it’s preceeding 5 years, it never made a profit. How would it survive? How long could Jay continue to work without being paid? How long could I do that? [Read more]

The Year in Review: 2007

I’m writing this review at the end of 2008. Basically, I decided it would be nice to have an annual journal of Tumbleweed’s growth process as a business.

When 2007 began, Jay was still running a solo operation. He was a one man show: designing houses, talking to the media, building houses, mailing books, and more. He hired the occasional assistant, doled out the basic tasks, but seemed to come up short when it came to meeting his real business needs. Jay and I had casually discussed partnering together; but the real change in thinking for me happened when Oprah called. In my mind, that was the turning point for Tumbleweed. Jay almost turned it down because he could barely handle the current amount of business. In the end, Jay appeared on Oprah, and I decided to join Jay in his quest to “dream big and build small” in March of 2007. [Read more]