Deaf & Hard of Hearing Business
27 08 2007Grant discussed about deaf and hard of hearing owned business. He remembers his father was in painting business for many years in Pittsburgh area back in 60’s and 70’s. Today many deaf businesses still exist today in construction, painting, and all that stuff. What’s more, more and more deaf and hard of hearing entered advanced business in 80’s & beyond. we saw it growing steady over years. (dot com boom, technology, better laws, etc.)
Fortunately, we have organization like NDBI (National Deaf Business Institute) but they have been either quiet or dead for long time time now. (Anybody know why?) Hopefully NDBI will be active again soon before he get old 
Many deaf and hard of hearing business struggle to stay into business – maybe they are doing just fine but they could have expand or acquire hearing business to stay strong into markets. (Top 500 Fortunate) We all need some kind of support system, mentoring, advice, workshop, etc.
Website: http://www.ndbi.org/
Also, he mentioned Deaf Professional Network website – it have been inactive for sometime since beginning of this year. Hopefully they will be back soon!
Website: http://www.deafprofessional.net/
Grant W Laird Jr.
http://blog.grantlairdjr.com
Good information about your business. I agree with you that we need better networking about deaf business in the USA. I am planning the world’s first convention in recreation and leisure within 2 years here in California and plan to include workshops on deaf businesses. I will have you in mind and will keep you informed. Keep up your good work with your business! Do you know Sid Ander? He runs a business in Texas too.
Bruce Gross, World Recreation Assn of the Deaf CEO/ Founder
http://www.wrad.org
We had a deaf shoe repair man in my home town, I believe he owned the business for around 30 years. People loved his work because he always returned their repaired shoes very shiny and clean.
One of my former school mates was a skilled cabinet maker and another younger one is a building contractor and is very talented in all phases of his work. A perfectionist!
Lantana
I think it is very important to support deaf-owned businesses. When money comes into our deaf world, we need to keep it circulating within our community instead of sending it right back out to the hearing world again.
Hello Grant,
I too have been trying to outreach to Deaf and Hard of Hearing business owners. I have my own business. I am a virtual assistant, I work for business owners on a sub-contract level for their administrative needs, bookkeeping etc. It allows business owners to delegate the work and not have to hire someone with payroll and more expenses. Best thing is I work in my office so no need to purchase additional office supplies too.
I have a nice start of a list of Deaf businesses in the Illinois area, as well as other areas of the country. I’m not sure how to go about making it public or networking. A passion of mine is networking, I love it, as well as being a business owner.
Look forward to networking with you soon.
Lisa (aka http://codadiva.wordpress.com)
Yeah, would be cool to see these list, I owns and run a towing company here in NC, this company is TandBTowing, Inc, hope to get touch with you all to see how things would happens, thanks
you’ve poor eye-contact. you always look at an object instead of people. Ever taken Public Speaking class at Gally? FYI you must have good eye-contact when talking or dealing business with pple.