Small Business Trends

David Tufte over at Voluntary Xchange continues his insightful chronicle about the economics and business lessons in the HBO series Deadwood.

If you live outside the United States or haven’t seen the series, you need to know that Deadwood is a Western. That fact alone is notable. When was the last time a Western TV series was made in the U.S.? Westerns are not exactly in vogue these days, but perhaps Deadwood is the start of a trend and we will see more of them.

I find the series fascinating because of all the business lessons in it. David Tufte is chronicling those lessons, including this subplot in the most recent episode:

“The effects of uncertainty on a small business are shown as Joni Stubbs notes that her plans for opening a new brothel have been on hold due to unclear funding.”

Seems like even in the old West women had trouble securing venture funding.