With spouse Stephen, Schutz founded Blue Mountain Arts, the company that eventually spun off into the multibillion-dollar bluemountain.com ad-driven e-greeting company. Already a book veteran with To My Daughter With Love
and other titles, Schutz skillfully chronicles her own and the company's history, from the early days, when the couple drove around in a van asking college bookstores to display the silkscreen posters they'd designed, to their spectacular online expansion. The transition was occasionally bumpy. Inexperienced at negotiating, the couple made some disastrous hiring decisions and some unprofitable sales arrangements, all unflinchingly recounted. Overall, though, the Schutzes effectively combined their family and business life, choosing their compromises with care. A long and painful copyright battle with Hallmark ended in their favor. The book concludes with Schutz discussing her childhood, early marriage, family and other nonbusiness topics. Unpretentious and relatively forthcoming about her approach to her personal life generally, and overly painstaking in describing the Hallmark court case, Schutz spends less time on business mechanics than on the conversations she and Steve had in and around this business, which may be even more useful to small-business owners looking for vision. Photos. (Aug. 15)
