"Where did they get those great idea?!" might be your first question when seeing a successful creative business. For entrepreneurs, innovative ideas are everywhere in their daily life. Take a look at these amazing 8 stories to see how success begins. For more tips and tricks to entrepreneurs, visit our blog www.peppergang.com/blog

1. INSPIRED WITH THESE
8 SMA LL BUSINESS
SUCCESS STORIES

2. CITIKITTY INCC A T S C O U L D B E A G O O D S O U R C E O F I N S P I R A T I O N
FOUNDER
REBECCA
RESCATE

3. REBECCA RESCATE
moved into a tiny apartment and
had to squeeze everything into that
place, when she realized that she
had no place for her cat’s litter box.
She decided to toilet train her cat,
but could not find an easy and cost-
effective toilet training kit. In order
to simplify the process, CitiKitty
Inc. was formed and is now
available in more than 1,000 stores
and the business has peaked to
about $1 million in annual sales.

4. LEE
ZALBEN
YOUR COLLEGE STUDY
BREAK HANGOUT

5. Lee Zalben came up with the idea for his business in
college…but not sitting in any classroom.
As Lee and his friends studied for finals, they developed a fun
competition to hold during those much-needed study breaks:
who could create the “craziest but best-tasting peanut butter
sandwich.”
Fast-forward to post-graduation when Lee saw an empty
storefront in the Greenwich Village area of New York City and
thought it would be an ideal locale for a peanut butter sandwich
shop. In 1998, The Peanut Butter & Co. Sandwich shop opened.
Offering gourmet peanut butter sandwiches as well as desserts,
milkshakes, and smoothies, the company has grown quickly,
selling its varieties of all-natural peanut butter in more than
15,000 supermarkets and specialty food stores.

6. SafetyBunns
Fall Prevention Pants for Hospital Use

7. A nurse for 35 years, Barb Przybylowicz,
saw first-hand how some patients,
especially those she worked with in
independent and assisted-living homes,
often need a more secure way of sitting
in chairs.
"The day came when a resident kept
'slip-sliding' from her chair," says
Przybylowicz.
That is when she came up with her idea:
pants designed with a non-slip area on
the buttocks to keep people safe from
slipping or sliding regardless of where
they sit. No longer in the nursing field,
Przybylowicz continues to help others
with her invention.

8. “My kids are slobs and when they come home, they throw
their backpacks against the foyer wall, kick off their
shoes into my white moldings, and generally destroy the
place,” says Debbie Wiener of Slobproof!
“My oldest son Sam came home from college for
Thanksgiving and saw me on my hands and knees,
filling in the dings and dents on my baseboard molding
with crusty cans of white paint. Without moving an
inch from the TV, he asked, ‘Hey Mom, isn't there a
better way for you to do that?’”
From that one statement, Wiener developed the
Slobproof! PaintPen, a vacuum-sealed paint pen that
can be filled with any color paint for touch-ups.
Slobproof!

9. InspiredbyAn
AnnoyedDad
BigHotDogwasthebrainstormof
DanAbbate,“daBoss”ofBigHotDog,
duringafamilyBBQ.Hisdad,Denny,
gotannoyedwhen“regular”hotdogs
wouldrollontotheground–which
gaveDantheideatocreateahotdog
thatwouldn’troll.

10. VERY SPECIFIC
SLICE OF
BROWNIE
THE LOVE OF

11. “One day I was eating a corner brownie, and
realized that I loved the corner the best...but never
really talked about it. Then I realized that was
probably true for lots of people,” says Matthew
Griffin, President and CEO of Baker's Edge.
Griffin decided to invent a pan that only made edge
pieces, resulting in the Edge Brownie Pan, which won
the Grand Champion prize for the Visa/MSN “Ideas
Happen” contest. Along with their other products, the
Edge Brownie Pan is sold online at their web site and
Amazon.com, as well as retailers like Sur La Table and
Solutions.

12. PROFESSIONAL GAMES INC.
NEED FOR A FATHER'S DAY GIFT

13. T I N A N E L S O N
“When my children were two, four
and five years old, I thought [a great
Father’s Day gift] would be a game
to teach them what Dad did after he
left for work each day. He's a lawyer,
and I found no game fitting that
description.”
"On Father's Day, I always give my
husband homemade gifts: the kids'
feet imprinted on a t-shirt, a
matching game using their photos,
ceramic pieces with my kids'
artwork, a laminated keepsake box
with their photos on it,"
So, she created her own game
—Lawsuit! which has won “Game of
the Year” by Creative Child magazine
five years in a row.

14. W A T C H I N G A F R I E N D
P I C K U P A G I R L
I N S P I R E D B Y

15. “A few years ago, I was out to dinner with a friend, and I had
excused myself from the table. When I returned, my
handsome dinner date had scribbled on the back of his
business card, ‘Want to have dinner?’ As we were leaving the
restaurant, he slid that card to an attractive woman at a
nearby table,” says Lori Cheek.
This gesture made her realize how many folks want to connect
with someone they see in real life, but don’t necessarily want
to hand over a business card—with so much personal
information—to a stranger.
In May 2010, she launched Cheekd.com, combining the use of
real cards and the technology to safely connect with each
other online.