The Nonprofit Entrepreneur offers a prudent, measured approach to nonprofit enterprise, emphasizing thorough analysis and ongoing vigilance throughout. It is the nonprofit's essential guide to minimizing the risks and reaping the benefits of viable income-generating ventures. In the chapters that follow, the authors take a prudent, measured approach to nonprofit enterprise. Each writes from the perspective of both practitioner and advisor. Bruce Hopkins provides an essential overview of the legal issues involved in both nonprofit status in general and earned income venturing in particular. Edward Skloot's two chapters are a basic starter kit for new ventures, although those groups with ongoing ventures will find in them several useful ideas and approaches as well.

The chapter by Christopher Lovelock and Charles Weinberg takes a longer look at marketing, stressing both the uniqueness of nonprofit organizations and the universality of good marketing techniques. Cynthia Massarsky's essay on business planning deliberately use a hybrid case, i.e., a nonprofit organization with multiple agendas - doing good and earning income at the same time. Ellen Arrick focuses on financial questions and illuminates for the reader how the investor or lender views risk and draws up risk profiles. The chapter by Wim Wiewel pays particular attention to structural issues and the decision points that organizations must pass through to get the form of their venture right.

The last two chapters discuss venturing from the vantage point of a specific subsector of the nonprofit world. The first, by Elliott Lang, focuses on museums and their shop operations. The second, by Nancy Haycock, speaks to the pitfalls of venturing and focuses directly on smaller nonprofits. She describes specific cases that illuminate the problems. Both caution that every step of the way must be taken with prudence and an eye to lowering risk.

CONTENTS
Introduction: The growth of, and rationale for, nonprofit enterprise by Edward Skloot.

1. The legal context of nonprofit enterprise by Bruce R. Hopkins.
2. How to think about enterprise by Edward Skloot.
3. The venture planning process by Edward Skloot
4. Planning and implementing marketing programs in nonprofit organizations by
    Christopher H. Lovelock and Charles B. Weinberg. 
5. Business planning for nonprofit enterprise by Cynthia W. Massarsky.
6. Financing the enterprise by Ellen Arrick.
7. Organizing for business: the organizational context of income-generating activities
    by Wim Wiewel.
8. Retail merchandising in smaller nonprofit institutions by Elliott N. Lang.
9. Stepping out into the marketplace: The pitfalls of earned income for the small
    nonprofit by Nancy E. Haycock.

Annotated Bibliography.
Index.

The Nonprofit Entrepreneur offers a prudent, measured approach to nonprofit enterprise, emphasizing thorough analysis and ongoing vigilance throughout. It is the nonprofit's essential guide to minimizing the risks and reaping the benefits of viable income-generating ventures. In the chapters that follow, the authors take a prudent, measured approach to nonprofit enterprise. Each writes from the perspective of both practitioner and advisor.