BUSINESS SPOTLIGHT PROFIT
It’s a Lifestyle
At a Glance Batteries Plus Bulbs 2710 2nd St S St. Cloud, MN 56301 320-240-2332 fax: 320-240-2333
For Brian and Dolora Musech, business ownership isn’t a job, it’s a lifestyle.
27 N Benton Dr. Sauk Rapids, MN 56379 320-230-2332 fax: 320-257-8271 info@mnbattery.com www.BatteriesPlus.com Business Description: Retail and wholesale of a wide variety of batteries and light bulbs; mobile device repair. Open seven days a week. Owners: Brian and Dolora Musech Opened: September 26, 1994 Number of Employees: 13 Joined the Chamber: August 1994
Personal ProfileS Brian Musech, 45 Dolora Musech, 44
Hometowns: Brian - Plymouth; Dolora - Hermantown, near Duluth
By Gail Ivers
Business Central: How did you happen to choose a Batteries Plus franchise? Brian Musech: A friend of Dolora’s family opened one in Duluth and it did pretty well. Dolora Musech: He approached my dad about helping him open one in St. Cloud. My dad thought “I have a daughter in St. Cloud.” I went up to talk to my dad about it and then came back and told Brian, who said... Brian: “How are you going to make a living selling batteries?” Dolora: How many times have we heard that! We were young and not that smart so we plunged in.
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Education: They met in college and are both graduates of St. Cloud State University
Family: Two sons: James 21, graduated from St. Cloud State in 2014; Victor, 19, in college in Montana
Brian: Young, dumb and broke. That’s a good combination for going into business. I’ve never really had a job. At least not in the traditional sense. What we do isn’t so much a job, as it’s what we do. Dolora: It’s a lifestyle more than a job. We’ve never been full time in the store — we have good people who do that so we can do other things — work on the business, rather than in the business. But it’s not a job — it’s a lifestyle. BC: What’s your biggest challenge? Dolora: Staffing. Finding people with the right combination
B u s i n e s s C e n t r a l M a g a z i n e • • J U LY / A U G U S T 2 0 1 4
Hobbies: Hunting and fishing, spending time with friends, outdoor activities, buying and selling businesses
of customer service skills and technical know-how. They have to understand watts, ohms, soldering, volts, color rendering indexing...it goes on and on. It’s very technical, but you need to be able to relate to the customer, too. Brian: Sometimes it’s very hard to turn off the business mode. It can get all consuming. I’m getting better now than when I was younger. I can’t go fishing for the afternoon and stop thinking about work. I need to go 500 miles away to really turn it off. BC
Timeline 1992 - 2007 Owned Professional Mosquito Control, sold to a company out of Chicago 1998-2000 Owned Preferred Service and Repair, sold it to the manager 2002 Opened Batteries Plus in Baxter 2006 Relocated the Baxter store to Brainerd 2007 Sold the Brainerd store to the store manager 2010 Brian began selling real estate for Granite City Real Estate, specifically sales of small and medium sized businesses December 2012 Opened Batteries Plus Bulbs in Sauk Rapids