IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/anname/v613y2007i1p108-130.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Secrets of Gazelles: The Differences between High-Growth and Low-Growth Business Owned by African American Entrepreneurs

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas D. Boston

    (Georgia Institute of Technology and EüQuant)

  • Linje R. Boston

    (EüQuant)

Abstract

The research findings are based on a national survey of 350 African American business owners whose companies had ten to one hundred employees. Each quarter of 2002 and 2003, owners were randomly selected and interviewed. Companies were classified into three groups according to their annual employment growth over five years: gazelles (20 percent or greater rate of growth), growth-oriented firms (1 to 19 percent), and no-growth firms (less than 1 percent or negative). In comparison to no-growth firms, gazelles were more likely to market to the government sector, less likely to compete on the basis of price, more likely to serve regional and national markets, and more likely to have fewer African Americans workers. CEOs of no-growth companies were more likely to have entered business because they lost a previous job. Surprisingly, no statistically significant differences appeared in thirty-nine other variables that defined owner attributes, firm characteristics, and business strategies of gazelles and no-growth firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas D. Boston & Linje R. Boston, 2007. "Secrets of Gazelles: The Differences between High-Growth and Low-Growth Business Owned by African American Entrepreneurs," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 613(1), pages 108-130, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:anname:v:613:y:2007:i:1:p:108-130
    DOI: 10.1177/0002716207303581
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716207303581
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0002716207303581?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Timothy Bates, 1985. "Entrepreneur Human Capital Endowments and Minority Business Viability," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 20(4), pages 540-554.
    2. Fairlie, Robert W, 1999. "The Absence of the African-American Owned Business: An Analysis of the Dynamics of Self-Employment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(1), pages 80-108, January.
    3. Cooper, Arnold C., 1993. "Challenges in predicting new firm performance," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 8(3), pages 241-253, May.
    4. Jan Christopher, 1998. "Minority business formation and survival: Evidence on business performance and viability," The Review of Black Political Economy, Springer;National Economic Association, vol. 26(1), pages 37-72, September.
    5. Woo, Carolyn Y. & Cooper, Arnold C. & Dunkelberg, William C., 1991. "The development and interpretation of entrepreneurial typologies," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 6(2), pages 93-114, March.
    6. Fairlie, Robert, 1999. "The Absence of the African-American Owned Business: An Analysis of the Dynamics of Self-Employment," Santa Cruz Department of Economics, Working Paper Series qt84v8v0nr, Department of Economics, UC Santa Cruz.
    7. Audretsch, David B, 1991. "New-Firm Survival and the Technological Regime," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 73(3), pages 441-450, August.
    8. Ken S. Cavalluzzo, 2002. "Competition, Small Business Financing, and Discrimination: Evidence from a New Survey," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75(4), pages 641-680, October.
    9. Gundry, Lisa K. & Welsch, Harold P., 2001. "The ambitious entrepreneur: High growth strategies of women-owned enterprises," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 453-470, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Robert W. Fairlie & Alicia M. Robb, 2007. "Why Are Black-Owned Businesses Less Successful than White-Owned Businesses? The Role of Families, Inheritances, and Business Human Capital," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 25(2), pages 289-323.
    2. Robert W. Fairlie & Alicia M. Robb, 2008. "Race and Entrepreneurial Success: Black-, Asian-, and White-Owned Businesses in the United States," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 026206281x, April.
    3. Michaelides, Marios, 2010. "Race and self-employment: The role of training programs, self-employment background, and access to financing," MPRA Paper 20884, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Fairlie Robert & Woodruff Christopher M., 2010. "Mexican-American Entrepreneurship," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 10(1), pages 1-44, February.
    5. Robert W. Fairlie, 2013. "Minority and immigrant entrepreneurs: access to financial capital," Chapters, in: Amelie F. Constant & Klaus F. Zimmermann (ed.), International Handbook on the Economics of Migration, chapter 8, pages 153-175, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    6. P. Köllinger & M. Minniti, 2006. "Not for Lack of Trying: American Entrepreneurship in Black and White," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 27(1), pages 59-79, August.
    7. Blanchflower, David G. & Wainwright, Jon, 2005. "An Analysis of the Impact of Affirmative Action Programs on Self-Employment in the Construction Industry," IZA Discussion Papers 1856, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Aaron K. Chatterji & Kenneth Y. Chay & Robert W. Fairlie, 2014. "The Impact of City Contracting Set-Asides on Black Self-Employment and Employment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(3), pages 507-561.
    9. Ken Cavalluzzo & John Wolken, 2005. "Small Business Loan Turndowns, Personal Wealth, and Discrimination," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 78(6), pages 2153-2178, November.
    10. Robert W. Fairlie & Harry A. Krashinsky, 2012. "Liquidity Constraints, Household Wealth, And Entrepreneurship Revisited," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 58(2), pages 279-306, June.
    11. David Blanchflower, 2009. "Minority self-employment in the United States and the impact of affirmative action programs," Annals of Finance, Springer, vol. 5(3), pages 361-396, June.
    12. Justin Van Der Sluis & Mirjam Van Praag & Wim Vijverberg, 2008. "Education And Entrepreneurship Selection And Performance: A Review Of The Empirical Literature," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(5), pages 795-841, December.
    13. José Millán & Emilio Congregado & Concepción Román, 2012. "Determinants of self-employment survival in Europe," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 38(2), pages 231-258, February.
    14. Alicia M. Robb & Robert W. Fairlie, 2007. "Access to Financial Capital among U.S. Businesses: The Case of African American Firms," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 613(1), pages 47-72, September.
    15. Alicia Robb & David T. Robinson, 2018. "Testing for racial bias in business credit scores," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 50(3), pages 429-443, March.
    16. Nadia Simoes & Nuno Crespo & Sandrina B. Moreira, 2016. "Individual Determinants Of Self-Employment Entry: What Do We Really Know?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(4), pages 783-806, September.
    17. Randall Akee & Elton Mykerezi & Richard M. Todd, 2017. "Reservation Employer Establishments: Data from the U.S. Census Longitudinal Business Database," Working Papers 17-57, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    18. Magnus Lofstrom, 2013. "Does self-employment increase the economic well-being of low-skilled workers?," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 40(4), pages 933-952, May.
    19. Magnus Lofstrom & Chunbei Wang, 2007. "Mexican-Hispanic Self-Employment Entry: The Role of Business Start-Up Constraints," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 613(1), pages 32-46, September.
    20. Lina Aldén & Mats Hammarstedt, 2016. "Discrimination in the Credit Market? Access to Financial Capital among Self-employed Immigrants," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 69(1), pages 3-31, February.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:anname:v:613:y:2007:i:1:p:108-130. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.