Sarah Brown
Every morning, Joe and Marlene Peterson can be found at a Starbucks, having their daily coffee and enjoying each other’s company. They’re a friendly couple who, like most, share common interests and similar experiences.
In this case, what they share is a lifetime of knowledge in business management, and a passion to help others who want to start, grow or sell a business.
Marlene, 69, and Joe, 71, are spending their retirement years trying to pass down their knowledge to both large and small business owners in the rural area through business management classes and advising.
Marlene worked as a facilities manager for various companies during her career, but her more valuable experience comes from 20 years as owner of Campagna Distinctive Flavors, a gourmet food manufacturing business based in the McDowell Creek area that began out of her herb garden.
She sold her recipes of herb vinegars, pestos, tapenades and other products on the wholesale market.
“I started like so many business owners start: I just started,” Marlene said. “I didn’t have a clue what I was doing. I didn’t know anything, except I knew how to make this product. So over the next 20 years I learned things the hard way, networking with other small businesses that were in the same industry, and I just learned as I went.”
Joe spent his last 15 working years as CFO and CEO of Oregon Fruit in Salem. He helped upgrade its valuation by changing its product and marketing strategy.
“It used to be canned fruit, and there’s nothing sexy about canned fruit,” Joe said. “What we needed to do was create things that people wanted.”
So, under his leadership, the company reduced production of the canned fruit and began creating frozen fruit drink mixes that were sold to the food industry, including overseas.
“What we did is we made the company look like a company that was of today and not grandma’s age,” he said. “We maximized what the owner could get out of that, and he told me he would not have been able to sell the business had it not been for the things we did over that period of time.”
With such a positive outcome from his experience, Joe now acts as business advisor through the Small Business Development Center at Linn-Benton Community College and through SCALE Oregon, which helps large businesses grow successfully.
“Joe and I make a good team because I work with these little small businesses, and his experience is much bigger,” Marlene said.
She started working with SBDC at Linn-Benton Community College just after she closed her business in Lebanon. She spent the first several years acting as an advisor and teaching at the center’s free “Going into Business” seminar, but last year Marlene launched a new, nine-month “Small Business Management” class with another advisor, George Medellin.
They first offered the class at Linn-Benton’s Sweet Home location, and seven local business owners from Sweet Home, Brownsville and Lebanon participated. They hope to have another successful class in Lebanon this year.
The Small Business Management class is meant to expose new ideas to those who’ve already been in business for a few years. It also provides personal advising on each business’ goals, and allows the business owners to engage with and learn from each other.
Marlene also wants to start another course, “Encore Entrepreneurship,” geared for a generally older crowd of business-wannabees who maybe took an early retirement or are thinking they want to do something but aren’t sure what, she explained.
“It’s aimed at those people that are looking for that encore,” she said. “A lot of us don’t want to stop; we’ve got too much energy and we feel like we want to do something different, we want to do something else.”
That explains Marlene’s active participation in SBDC, of which she says it keeps her “vital and engaged.” She’s often surprised by the amount of knowledge she learned by running her own company for 20 years, and she’s received a lot of appreciation from clients who’ve gleaned lessons through her.
“It gives me a good feeling to feel like I can provide something,” she said.
Joe said he likes to help business owners for two reasons, one selfish and the other unselfish.
“The selfish reason is to keep my brain sharp as I get older. The unselfish reason is it allows me to give back,” he said.
While he does help alongside Marlene as business advisor through SBDC, Joe prefers to work with the bigger companies who have bigger issues to tackle, he said.
“My specialty is more the startups or the really small businesses,” Marlene said.
George Medellin, the SBDC’s Sweet Home representative, who also serves as president of the Chamber of Commerce, co-taught the small business owners class with Marlene last year. He said both Petersons bring a lot of expertise to the table.
“Joe brought the experience of working with multi-million dollar businesse,” Medellin said. “Marlene excels in finance and step-by-step.
“Honestly, maybe we haven’t done enough to advertise what they can do.”
Outside of assisting business owners, Marlene and Joe like to spend their retirement years in the garden. They maintain a couple acres of flower beds (including Joe’s favorite: dahlias), and grow berries and vegetables.
They also enjoy traveling, and taming down the newest addition to their family, a four-year-old Border Collie.
“Boy, does that keep me busy!” Joe said of the dog.
Marlene also recently joined the board of directors for the Sweet Home Chamber of Commerce.
“I see things happening in Sweet Home,” she said. “I see the community working towards that revitalization. It just takes time and a concerted effort from a lot of different entities that will contribute and work together to help the community gain that foothold. So I see some interesting things happening that make me want to be a part of it. It’s a small community, but it can be a healthy community.”