Cambodian entrepreneurs finding success, trying new ventures in the city
By Alexander Reid, Globe Staff
Boston Globe (Mass, USA)
September 3, 2006
The American dream is the immigrant's dream, and in Lowell it's been a vision strong enough to cast a new face on the city's commercial landscape.
Hundreds of Asian-run businesses, including travel agencies, jewelry stores, restaurants, and food markets, have anchored a presence in the city famous for its history as a center for textile manufacturing.
Driving today's trend are Cambodians, who, as the city's largest Asian ethnic group, have found an entrepreneurial niche in modern-day Lowell. They are also diversifying their ambitions, expanding in ways that were unheard of years ago. While restaurants and food markets still predominate, merchants are exploring specialty businesses aimed at customers beyond the Cambodian community.
The growth of Asian businesses in Lowell is even more dramatic than the national trend. A recent study by the US Census Bureau charting growth of Asian-owned businesses between 1997 and 2002 indicated an increase of 24 percent nationally.
Statewide, Asian-owned businesses increased 42 percent, according to the Census. But in Lowell, they grew by a whopping 150 percent, from 297 in 1997 to 743 in 2002.
Russell Smith, director of the Lowell Small Business Assistance Center, said immigrant-run businesses represent perhaps the fastest route up the economic ladder for newcomers to the city.
``The beauty of these small businesses is that, if they're successful, they can become a way to avoid the treadmill of low-wage, unskilled jobs," he said. Entrepreneurs ``believe they can make just as much income, if not more, by going into business for themselves as they could in a low-paying job. So they figure it's worth taking the risk."
Nowhere is the entrepreneurial spirit more visible than on Branch Street in Lowell Highlands, where Chou Huynh presides over several family-owned enterprises, including a supermarket and an adjacent office building that houses an insurance and real estate office, a tailor, and a video store.
Huynh, 59, moved to Lowell in 1983 and sold rice door-to-door while also working a factory job. With his savings, he was able to open his first business, a small produce market on Market Street, in 1984. Lowell, he said, presented him with plenty of opportunity.
``I came at a good time and worked very hard," he said. ``There were about 50 other Cambodian families living here then but no Cambodian market for them to buy food. I said to myself, `Why not open a store myself?' "
Historically, many factors have contributed to the surge in Asian entrepreneurship in Lowell. It's mainly an outgrowth of the city's large Cambodian migration that in the late 1970s brought Cambodian refugees, chased from their country by the violent regime of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge.
Cambodians are a decidedly visible segment of Lowell today, numbering almost 10,000, according to Census numbers, although locals say the actual population is three times higher. Lowell's overall population is about 101,000, according to the 2000 Census.
A large number of Cambodians arrived in Lowell equipped with skills they learned in their homeland or elsewhere, said Vong Ros , director of the Cambodian Mutual Assistance Association.
In Lowell, the newcomers found cheap rents for storefronts and larger spaces in parts of downtown. They also found neighborhoods populated by Cambodian households, largely in The Acre and Highlands, where people share tastes and customs from their native country.
``Cambodian businesses followed the population," Ros said. ``People who were savvy enough looked around and could see there were so many Cambodian people but no businesses catering to them or selling the things they liked. There was a void, and who better to do this than someone who also came from Cambodia?"
Most enterprises started with little more than personal savings as seed money. Entrepreneurs employed mostly relatives who worked long hours six and sometimes seven days a week. Customers were largely from within the community.
Over time, some enterprises prospered enough to move from small storefronts to larger venues with outside employees.
Huynh, for example, moved from his 400-square-foot store on Market Street to a refurbished warehouse measuring 6,000 square feet on Chelmsford Street several years later. The family later opened the Branch Street store.
``Business was good, expanding rapidly, so I thought I should get more space if I want to keep it growing," he said.
Generally, expansion is a logical step for merchants who have enjoyed sustained success early on, specialists say.
``They start out as small mom-and-pop with very little start-up capital and the hope is that the business will make enough money to help the family survive," said Marcia Hohn, director of public education for the Immigrant Learning Center, a Malden-based agency that studied trends among immigrants in business and housing. ``Once they get past the survival point, they start to think big."
Savuth ``Woody" Ly is co-owner of a business on Congress Street that customizes brake rotors for high-performance cars. ``I came here and saw that there was no one else around doing this," he said. ``I got here at a good time because right now there's not much competition for what I'm doing."
Though Asian businesses account for only about one of seven businesses in Lowell, according to Census figures from 2002, their growth has been enough to further promote Lowell's profile as an ethnic melting pot, a city that has seen successive waves of immigrant groups, starting with the English in the 1600s, then Germans, who were followed by Irish, Greeks, Portuguese, Latinos, and Africans.
And the healthy Asian business scene offers the city a draw for visitors of many cultures.
David Turcotte, an adjunct professor in regional economic and social planning at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, speculates that the burgeoning presence of Cambodian merchants could create, in some areas of the city, an atmosphere as ethnically distinct as Boston's Chinatown or North End.
``A thriving Cambodian business community could be a tourism asset," he said. ``People who come in from the outside could be drawn to these areas of the city for the ethnic flavor. There's a strong presence here, with the shops and the restaurants, that you wouldn't find anywhere else. People like what's different."
Alexander Reid can be reached at A_Reid@globe.com.
By Alexander Reid, Globe Staff
Boston Globe (Mass, USA)
September 3, 2006
The American dream is the immigrant's dream, and in Lowell it's been a vision strong enough to cast a new face on the city's commercial landscape.
Hundreds of Asian-run businesses, including travel agencies, jewelry stores, restaurants, and food markets, have anchored a presence in the city famous for its history as a center for textile manufacturing.
Driving today's trend are Cambodians, who, as the city's largest Asian ethnic group, have found an entrepreneurial niche in modern-day Lowell. They are also diversifying their ambitions, expanding in ways that were unheard of years ago. While restaurants and food markets still predominate, merchants are exploring specialty businesses aimed at customers beyond the Cambodian community.
The growth of Asian businesses in Lowell is even more dramatic than the national trend. A recent study by the US Census Bureau charting growth of Asian-owned businesses between 1997 and 2002 indicated an increase of 24 percent nationally.
Statewide, Asian-owned businesses increased 42 percent, according to the Census. But in Lowell, they grew by a whopping 150 percent, from 297 in 1997 to 743 in 2002.
Russell Smith, director of the Lowell Small Business Assistance Center, said immigrant-run businesses represent perhaps the fastest route up the economic ladder for newcomers to the city.
``The beauty of these small businesses is that, if they're successful, they can become a way to avoid the treadmill of low-wage, unskilled jobs," he said. Entrepreneurs ``believe they can make just as much income, if not more, by going into business for themselves as they could in a low-paying job. So they figure it's worth taking the risk."
Nowhere is the entrepreneurial spirit more visible than on Branch Street in Lowell Highlands, where Chou Huynh presides over several family-owned enterprises, including a supermarket and an adjacent office building that houses an insurance and real estate office, a tailor, and a video store.
Huynh, 59, moved to Lowell in 1983 and sold rice door-to-door while also working a factory job. With his savings, he was able to open his first business, a small produce market on Market Street, in 1984. Lowell, he said, presented him with plenty of opportunity.
``I came at a good time and worked very hard," he said. ``There were about 50 other Cambodian families living here then but no Cambodian market for them to buy food. I said to myself, `Why not open a store myself?' "
Historically, many factors have contributed to the surge in Asian entrepreneurship in Lowell. It's mainly an outgrowth of the city's large Cambodian migration that in the late 1970s brought Cambodian refugees, chased from their country by the violent regime of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge.
Cambodians are a decidedly visible segment of Lowell today, numbering almost 10,000, according to Census numbers, although locals say the actual population is three times higher. Lowell's overall population is about 101,000, according to the 2000 Census.
A large number of Cambodians arrived in Lowell equipped with skills they learned in their homeland or elsewhere, said Vong Ros , director of the Cambodian Mutual Assistance Association.
In Lowell, the newcomers found cheap rents for storefronts and larger spaces in parts of downtown. They also found neighborhoods populated by Cambodian households, largely in The Acre and Highlands, where people share tastes and customs from their native country.
``Cambodian businesses followed the population," Ros said. ``People who were savvy enough looked around and could see there were so many Cambodian people but no businesses catering to them or selling the things they liked. There was a void, and who better to do this than someone who also came from Cambodia?"
Most enterprises started with little more than personal savings as seed money. Entrepreneurs employed mostly relatives who worked long hours six and sometimes seven days a week. Customers were largely from within the community.
Over time, some enterprises prospered enough to move from small storefronts to larger venues with outside employees.
Huynh, for example, moved from his 400-square-foot store on Market Street to a refurbished warehouse measuring 6,000 square feet on Chelmsford Street several years later. The family later opened the Branch Street store.
``Business was good, expanding rapidly, so I thought I should get more space if I want to keep it growing," he said.
Generally, expansion is a logical step for merchants who have enjoyed sustained success early on, specialists say.
``They start out as small mom-and-pop with very little start-up capital and the hope is that the business will make enough money to help the family survive," said Marcia Hohn, director of public education for the Immigrant Learning Center, a Malden-based agency that studied trends among immigrants in business and housing. ``Once they get past the survival point, they start to think big."
Savuth ``Woody" Ly is co-owner of a business on Congress Street that customizes brake rotors for high-performance cars. ``I came here and saw that there was no one else around doing this," he said. ``I got here at a good time because right now there's not much competition for what I'm doing."
Though Asian businesses account for only about one of seven businesses in Lowell, according to Census figures from 2002, their growth has been enough to further promote Lowell's profile as an ethnic melting pot, a city that has seen successive waves of immigrant groups, starting with the English in the 1600s, then Germans, who were followed by Irish, Greeks, Portuguese, Latinos, and Africans.
And the healthy Asian business scene offers the city a draw for visitors of many cultures.
David Turcotte, an adjunct professor in regional economic and social planning at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, speculates that the burgeoning presence of Cambodian merchants could create, in some areas of the city, an atmosphere as ethnically distinct as Boston's Chinatown or North End.
``A thriving Cambodian business community could be a tourism asset," he said. ``People who come in from the outside could be drawn to these areas of the city for the ethnic flavor. There's a strong presence here, with the shops and the restaurants, that you wouldn't find anywhere else. People like what's different."
Alexander Reid can be reached at A_Reid@globe.com.
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