While the exact number varies, researchers put the average number of women-owned businesses across America at about 40 %. That number takes a leap in Lincoln’s downtown where nearly all are women owned and/or managed.
“Women-owned businesses are growing much faster than all businesses,” said American Express research advisor Geri Stengel in a Jan. 2019 Forbes article. “From 2007 to 2018, women-owned businesses grew by 58% in terms of the number of firms and 46% in terms of revenue.”
Economists point to the financial need for a dual income as a driving factor but social shifts, which have rewritten a woman’s role in society over the past century, also contribute to the increase.
Up through the nineteenth century, womenowned businesses were primarily taverns and alehouses, millinery and retail shops, hotels, and brothels. They provided an income for unmarried women.
In the early 1900s women earned the right to vote and started making a place for themselves in the business world. However,
it was World War II that would cause the next big shift in female entrepreneurship. Women were brought into the workforce filling jobs as the men went off to war.
When the war ended women were pushed out of those jobs to make openings for the returning servicemen. While some returned home, others seized the opportunity to open their own businesses. By 1950, womenowned businesses rose from about 600,000 in 1945 to nearly 1 million.
Over the next few decades, a baby boom, high divorce rates and technology, all played roles in moving women out of the house and into the workforce.
“In the last 30 or 40 years they left the home front and went into the storefront,” said Lincoln business owner Marilyn Helmer. “What I saw happening was women were starting to work outside of the home whereas before they were only selling Avon or doing Tupperware parties and things like that.”
Women were seeing more opportunity for them to contribute to the household and with modernization their home responsibilities were not as time consuming.
“They had all the modern appliances,” Helmer said. “They had extra time, so why not put that into some business.”
With about 36 years of business ownership under her belt, Helmer, owner of Village Lines, has seen the changes in Lincoln’s business structure firsthand and how societal norms and shifting economies have driven women entrepreneurs.
She said especially in small farming towns like Lincoln, the women are taking a lead role in keeping the downtown alive. While there is still a bit of a glass ceiling, it has cracked because of the work women have done to prove themselves in the business world. “I think we have more energy,” she said. “Women can multitask better and I think they have a bit more passionate to do what they set out to do and they have to work harder to get it done.”
The glass ceiling in small towns may be easier to shatter than in other places.
Kelly Gourley, owner of Post Rock Fitness said she has never come up against any issues because she is female.
“This is a small town where we all know each other and I think people put a lot of respect on hard work,” she said. “People know when someone’s working hard. I’ve never felt anything in trying to put my business together where if I was a man, it would have been easier. It was difficult but I think it would have been difficult for a man too.”
Revitalizing downtown Across the country downtowns started crumbling several decades ago. Big box stores offered lower prices, improved roadways and vehicles made it easier to travel to larger towns.
In a effort to bring life back to small downtowns, abandoned buildings are being renovated to make room for niche markets — and the women are behind it.
“I think women are a bit more of the dreamers,” said Gourley, who is also the director of the Lincoln County Economic Development Foundation. “They can look at something and maybe see past, in a downtown environment, the dents and the scratches and see what it’s supposed to be or what it could be and think creatively around that.”
In Lincoln she sees less of the downtown revitalization being about men and women as it is a generational issue. The older generation remembers what the downtown used to be and has difficulty moving past the old image. Businesses, like Village Lines, Seirer’s Clothing and M&J Furniture and Appliance, all of which have been staples in Lincoln’s downtown for decades, set the example for changing with the times.
“I feel like the younger people … they want to give it a try,” Gourley said. “I think Marilyn is an excellent example. She’s got a dream and she’s held on to that for a long time and she still wants to have a role in that, which is amazing. And, she wants to make room for others who have that same kind of idea of what we can be and where we can go.”
Haylee Hoch, owner of Violettes Coffee and Café, falls into the younger generation who said there were several guiding factors in her wanting to open her own business.
She sees the past, present and future in the limestone walls of Lincoln’s downtown. “When the businesses leave then there’s no longer a town,” she said.
She wanted to be part of keeping Lincoln a thriving community.
Kris Heinze, marketing coordinator for the Lincoln County Economic Development Foundation, agreed that there is a generational shift happening.
“I would imagine any town in the western or eastern two thirds of Kansas is probably having some level of one generation ready to retire and another generation — it’s time for them to fill in those gaps,” Heinze said.
She said she believes part of the survival of the small downtown businesses is hinged on face-to-face conversations among the business owners but it can make the difference between success and failure. Knowing each other and communicating with one another are two different things.
“It’s maybe even more challenging in a small town to get everybody together and get to know each other and make time for sharing knowledge,” she said.
Balancing work, business
Another shift, which is playing out in Lincoln, is that women are following their passion, some are turning their hobbies into a paying gig but they are not giving up their full-time jobs. Rather than risking everything, some are open with limited hours.
Deb Lyne, a nurse practitioner and owner of KC Quilting Company, moved her home quilting business to a space inside Village Lines, which could accommodate her equipment. Her hours are worked around her full-time job.
Likewise, Gourley maintains her full-time position while operating Post Rock Fitness. For her, starting the fitness center was less about a hobby than it was a passion. “There’s a difference between wanting to fulfill a dream and just having a hobby,” Gourley said. “I don’t know that hobbies give somebody that kind of drive to be able to balance everything that you’ve got to balance and prioritize every day.”
Lyne, a wife and mother of four, said being a workaholic helps her balance work, her business and family.
“When I was working in the Intensive Care Unit, I [had] only three twelves (hour shifts) a week, which made it easier,” Lyne said. “But now I work five days a week. I work Monday through Thursday, all day and then Friday mornings. I come here Friday afternoons and Saturdays and that’s when I have my shop open.”
Lyne lived and worked in Kansas City and eventually found herself making so many quilt tops that it became feasible to buy a longarm quilting machine.
“Then we moved back home (to Lincoln) to be around family and we moved into a 1950s house, which did not support my long arm,” she said. “That is how I got here.”
Both women have physically and mentally demanding jobs and while their income supports their business ventures, they said having a partner who supports them goes a long way.
“He’s always supported me and everything I’ve done,” Lyne said of her husband. “He supported me throughout my schooling as far as emotional support. I went to school while I was working.”
Gourley said finding the balance is difficult because of how demanding her day job is.
“I really love my job,” she said. “I put more into it than I probably should. Something I’ve been trying to understand is this balance.”
In addition to her fulltime job and Post Rock Fitness, she helps her husband with his business, which is a hunting lodge operated out of their home. “I will readily admit it is a lot to juggle every day,” she said.
Hoch also is learning about juggling as she opened her coffee shop four days before Christmas and just a few months before having a baby.
“It’s tough,” she said. “I’m always busy. I get up before everybody else in my family gets up and I come here.” But with careful planning and keeping a tight schedule she is finding the balance between business and family, which includes a toddler and an infant.
“I make sure I have time slots for everything,” she said. “I’m at work 4 a.m. to 3 pm. Then, I’ve got about an hour of me time, then I pick up the kids and we do our regular evening routines.”
Although the men are there to support the women, she said she think, especially for young mothers, entrepreneurship is more difficult because of societal expectations.
“We’re expected to do everything at work and at home,” she said. “Finding time to sleep is difficult some days. It is definitely harder because if I work all day, and I come home, I’m expected to just pick up no matter what.”
Her observation, however, is not a complaint. She said she knew going into the business there would be difficulties and the benefits far outweigh the negative.
While the day-to-day is structured and planned out, owning her own business gives her the flexibility to adjust her schedule for family.
“If there’s a family thing going on on a Saturday, I’ll close,” she said. “I don’t stick with everything to a tee and I’m not afraid to close for a day if I need to do something with my family.”
A (Wo)man’s world A quote often credited to the Greek philosopher Heraclitus states, “There is nothing permanent except change.” No truer words can be said of the business world.
Jody Schulz co-owns M&J Furniture and Appliance with her husband. Furniture and appliances weren’t the couple’s first venture. They had to change their entire business plan when the person they were leasing a building from decided he wanted to put in a bowling alley where their store was.
So, they changed gears and opened the furniture store in the mid-80s. Since that time, she has seen many changes in the role women play in the business ownership. “You see more women now than you did back then,” she said. “A lot of times you had a family type deal that the woman was in. Now, you see more single women that are in charge of a business.”
When she and her husband started M&J, it was only about 10 years after women had the legal right to own a credit card in their name. Although the amount of credit a woman was afforded remained less than her male peers.
Unfair gender-based lending practices eventually led to the 1974 Fair Credit Opportunity Act, which made it illegal for a financial institution to discriminate against applicants based on their religion, race, national origin— and gender. Schulz said when banks began lending to women, it opened doors of opportunity. Changes in societal norms on the home front have also made it easier for women.
“I think women had so much more of the home responsibility,” she said. “With the younger generation, it’s a little more evenly dispersed. I think the partners actually share more in that so the woman feels she has more time to do a business of some kind or do something on her own.” Men are also more receptive to the idea of a women earning as much or more than they do, she said.
Some women, like Vicki Meier, who owns Lincoln Building Supply, jumped headfirst into a male dominated industry, but she never gave that two thoughts. While her business isn’t downtown, she is representative of the entrepreneurial spirit in Lincoln’s women. “I’m a daughter of a farmer, I’m a wife of a farmer,” she said. “I’ve farmed my whole life so for me it’s really easy to talk to men, probably even easier than women sometimes because I’ve grown up in a man’s world.”
That’s not to say there hasn’t been a time or two that a male customer hasn’t doubted her knowledge.
“There’s been a few of them that’s come in here and think when you talk about trusses or windows or something — they think you don’t know anything,” she said. “It doesn’t take long to prove (I) know what (I’m) talking about. When you’re talking the same terminology and language, they pick up on that.”
She had worked at the store for 10 years prior to buying it and by that time she knew enough about the business and the market to have the confidence she needed to take it over.
“I was putting my heart and soul into it anyway,” she said. “I thought I might as well be making the money as a business owner and turning it and doing what I wanted to do instead of just being a worker and doing what you’re supposed to do.”
While her industry may be on the cusp of male domination, she said she is seeing more female representation. Key to success Heinze spoke about the importance of business owners getting together periodically to talk, compare notes and collaborate. However, she also knows how difficult it is for people to find the time to get together.
“I think there’re things to be learned from just having face-to-face conversations,” she said. “But we’re all living a very fast-paced life.”
This is where Gourley credits Helmer as being the one in town who will visit with others and ask, “How’s it going?” and to make a point to help facilitate conversations and provide incubator space like she has for the KC Quilting Company.
Women who are at different stages of business ownership offer their advice for those contemplating the leap from employee to business owner: “Find a niche that is needed. It just so happens that we don’t have fabric in Lincoln. (Quilting) is something that a lot of people in the community do. But I won’t say that it supports itself yet. It doesn’t. It’s not a standalone business yet. I have to be willing to burden that bank roll. (And) Expect to work hard, it takes a lot of work. Be nice. Customer service is huge.” Deb Lyne “Be very clear on what your dream is and what your vision is and what your capabilities are. You can’t do everything and you have to really understand going into it, where you’re going to do well
