1. What are the potential difficulties of starting a business in a transition economy?

2. What are the key success factors of the Fleet Sheet?

3. What is the relationship between education, experience, personal skills and entrepreneurship for Erik Best?

4. What have you learnt about entrepreneurship from this case?

5. Erik Best did not prepare a business plan for starting Fleet Sheet. What type of business would benefit most from a business plan?

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Another serious problem was the lack of experience in running private businesses that existed in Eastern Europe. Most hopeful entrepreneurs had lived all of their lives in a Socialist economy and had no training or knowledge related to the way in which one becomes an entrepreneur. It was into this environment that many orga- nizations from the West sent consultants to assist with the revitalization of the econ- omy as a free market. The M.B.A. Enterprise Corps was one such operation. Origination of Idea for the Fleet Sheet After working in Prague for a year, it became clear to Erik that international com- panies that had established offices and operations in the Czech Republic had diffi- culty in obtaining accurate and timely information on political and economic trends in the country upon which to make business decisions. From his work as a management consultant, he knew that decision makers in companies are very busy, and those operating in the Czech Republic would need information that was very concise and written in English. At the time, no such product was available in the country. It occurred to him that a 1-page faxed bulletin would be the best format for such a paper. The fax was also an inexpensive medium to use. He knew that in the beginning there would not be much news to report, and a 1-page sheet of paper would probably hold all he needed to print. By early 1992, he had worked out all of the details to begin the business, and on February 22nd he published the first issue. Erik believed that if he had 4 or 5 sub- scribers in the first month, the product would be successful. In fact, approximately 15 to 20 subscribers signed up in the first month of operations. By early Spring of 2000, there were somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,000 subscribers receiving the Fleet Sheet on a regular basis. Believing that the life cycle of his product would be relatively short, Erik took little thought to establishing a permanent structure for his business. He set it up as a sole proprietorship, and did not bother with a business plan since the opera- tions of the company were uncomplicated and easy to establish. By 2000, he had 8 staff members in the company. Some of the staff came in the very early morning to review newspapers and begin translating the news from Czech to English. Other members of the staff came in around 7:30 A.M. and were involved in distribution and client support. Erik assumed the major responsibility for picking out the most important news to be translated and distributed in the Fleet Sheet. He believed a key competitive advantage of the Fleet Sheet was its emphasis on a quality product that reported useful Czech economic and political news. Occasionally, the Sheet had made a person unhappy by interpreting something incorrectly. However, if Erik agreed with the person's argument, he would admit it and print a retraction. He had found it important to listen to customer complaints and recognize the needs of the customer. He attempted to treat his readers as equal partners. The name for his paper came from the fact that it was issued in a timely manner, and also in reference to Fleet Street in London where all of the major newspapers once resided before moving to the Docklands. The Pricing Strategy Erik realized immediately that the major publication constraint would be the num- ber of people he could physically fax copies of the Fleet Sheet to in a short period of time. This was primarily due to the fact that he knew there would be a limitation Another serious problem was the lack of experience in running private businesses that existed in Eastern Europe. Most hopeful entrepreneurs had lived all of their lives in a Socialist economy and had no training or knowledge related to the way in which one becomes an entrepreneur. It was into this environment that many orga- nizations from the West sent consultants to assist with the revitalization of the econ- omy as a free market. The M.B.A. Enterprise Corps was one such operation. Origination of Idea for the Fleet Sheet After working in Prague for a year, it became clear to Erik that international com- panies that had established offices and operations in the Czech Republic had diffi- culty in obtaining accurate and timely information on political and economic trends in the country upon which to make business decisions. From his work as a management consultant, he knew that decision makers in companies are very busy, and those operating in the Czech Republic would need information that was very concise and written in English. At the time, no such product was available in the country. It occurred to him that a 1-page faxed bulletin would be the best format for such a paper. The fax was also an inexpensive medium to use. He knew that in the beginning there would not be much news to report, and a 1-page sheet of paper would probably hold all he needed to print. By early 1992, he had worked out all of the details to begin the business, and on February 22nd he published the first issue. Erik believed that if he had 4 or 5 sub- scribers in the first month, the product would be successful. In fact, approximately 15 to 20 subscribers signed up in the first month of operations. By early Spring of 2000, there were somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,000 subscribers receiving the Fleet Sheet on a regular basis. Believing that the life cycle of his product would be relatively short, Erik took little thought to establishing a permanent structure for his business. He set it up as a sole proprietorship, and did not bother with a business plan since the opera- tions of the company were uncomplicated and easy to establish. By 2000, he had 8 staff members in the company. Some of the staff came in the very early morning to review newspapers and begin translating the news from Czech to English. Other members of the staff came in around 7:30 A.M. and were involved in distribution and client support. Erik assumed the major responsibility for picking out the most important news to be translated and distributed in the Fleet Sheet. He believed a key competitive advantage of the Fleet Sheet was its emphasis on a quality product that reported useful Czech economic and political news. Occasionally, the Sheet had made a person unhappy by interpreting something incorrectly. However, if Erik agreed with the person's argument, he would admit it and print a retraction. He had found it important to listen to customer complaints and recognize the needs of the customer. He attempted to treat his readers as equal partners. The name for his paper came from the fact that it was issued in a timely manner, and also in reference to Fleet Street in London where all of the major newspapers once resided before moving to the Docklands. The Pricing Strategy Erik realized immediately that the major publication constraint would be the num- ber of people he could physically fax copies of the Fleet Sheet to in a short period of time. This was primarily due to the fact that he knew there would be a limitation