Franchise Takes Skills He Didn’t Know He Had

HIS CHALLENGE: Whitaker had spent 30 years in telecommunications and was a senior staff manager at AT&T; in 1985 when his bosses told him his department would be eliminated in six months. At the time he was 48, with one of five daughters still at home.

HOW HE COPED: First he became a consultant in his field. But in 1991 he realized he probably wouldn’t be able to sell the business to get retirement money, so he bought a Mail Boxes Etc. franchise.

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Gene Whitaker opted for a buyout to start a telecommunications consulting business out of his Glendale home, using knowledge and skills acquired during his corporate career.

Fifty thousand dollars from the buyout enabled him to purchase computers and sustain Delphi Associates through the first year, when income for his new company was scant. After six years, he was making about 75% of his AT&T; salary.

In 1991, he realized that if he wanted to sell his business for retirement money, he would need something more tangible that others could easily take over. After much research--and knowing that franchises and small businesses can be risky--he bought a Mail Boxes Etc. franchise for $85,000, using savings and home refinancing.

Now Whitaker and his wife work together in their Glendale store, sometimes putting in 70-hour weeks. They don’t mind the long hours because as owners they set the agenda, he said. Leaving corporate security behind was scary, Whitaker said, but extensive corporate training at AT&T; prepared him to run his own shop and profit from skills he never got a chance to use at the corporation.

“It was kind of a revelation,” he said. “I had more skills than I thought I had.”