Would Marketing Have Paid the Tax Bill?

Ice cream is cool, not paying taxes makes the state hot This morning I started the day reading Local Hero or Tax Cheat? in this month’s Inc. Magazine.

It’s the story of how the owner of a Massachusetts-based ice cream store built a business but didn’t set aside money to pay taxes. Once the state padlocked the business for nonpayment, a former worker helped the owner raise money by setting up a Web site to take donations through PayPal.

As donations arrived, so did lots of pro and con comments on the site. Some said that they were happy to send a few dollars, while others were enraged that a firm who neglected their taxes now asked the general public to pay for them.

Throughout the pre-padlock part of the story, I never once read anything about the business’s marketing plan. There seems to have been none. The text reads as though the owner set everything up in a “build it, and they will come” format.

I don’t know if marketing would have increased their sales, thereby eliminating the tax problem. But I do know that no marketing spells disaster.

I encourage you to read the story in print version, as it’s not yet available online. It’s a great lesson in not only marketing, but also in planning, growth, and responsibility.

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