Books
Bulk foods
Clothing and footwear
Dry goods
Farm supplies
Farmers’ markets
Garden supplies
Greenhouses
Groceries
Hardware
Household appliances
Quilts and crafts
Roadside stands
Services
Accounting
Auctioneering
Battery and electrical work
Butchering
Clock and watch repair
Engine repair
Horse shoeing
Leather and harness
Printing
Sewing
Spray painting
Tent rentals
Upholstery
Tombstone engraving
Tree trimming
Trades
Carriage restoration
Foundry
Masonry
Plumbing
Roofing and siding
Painting
Tin fabrication
Woodworking
Cabinetry
Furniture (household)
Furniture (lawn)
Kitchens
Hardwood lumber
Sawmills
A loose friendship network that crisscrosses settlements and affiliations supports and energizes Amish enterprises. Since 1981 Amish woodworkers have gathered annually to discuss the latest developments in cabinetry, millwork, and furniture making. Accountants, harness and buggy makers, machine shop operators, and quilters hold similar gatherings.17 Unlike trade shows that convene in hotels or convention centers, these events, often referred to as reunions, rotate among Amish communities, and attendees board in local homes. Participants often bring their families, because the multi-day gatherings can wrap work, vacation, travel, and reunion into a single trip.
Cultural Resources and Restraints
One way of conceptualizing Amish businesses is to see them as the outcome of a tension between resources and restraints in Amish society, as shown in figure 16.2. Amish cultural values both invigorate and obstruct microenterprises. Resources in the Amish social capital reservoir include a rigorous work ethic, a frugality that minimizes overhead costs, a pool of ethnic labor, entrepreneurial skills forged on the farm, large extended families, and a distinctive “Amish” brand that makes their products attractive. These assets, similar across settlements, supply ample social and cultural capital for the formation and success of Amish businesses.18
Other factors, at least at first blush, thwart business success. Cultural restraints on litigation, public electricity, motor vehicle and computer ownership, sales on Sunday, formal education, and commercial insurance, as well as the values of Gelassenheit—humility, modesty, smallness, and deference to others—stifle the ability of Amish businesses to be competitive. These cultural factors can retard the entrepreneurial spirit and impede business development.
The interplay between cultural resources and restraints varies from place to place, demonstrating the decisive role of local conditions in shaping commercial activities. Nonetheless, Amish enterprises are negotiated outcomes—compromises between energizing assets and cultural restraints.
But this is not the end of the story. As microenterprises grow and flourish, they affect traditional beliefs and practices, altering the very values that birthed them in the first place. The new material realities—businesses fostered by Amish values—are now revising long-entrenched views about individualism, gender roles, social equality, rationality, and separation from the world. In short, this mini-industrial revolution is transforming Amish life in ways that will produce significant long-term consequences.
FIGURE 16.2. An Interactive Model of Amish Businesses
Failure and Success
Failure
The story of Amish-owned businesses is a remarkable tale of business neophytes without high school diplomas launching successful enterprises that have flourished despite many technological limits and cultural obstacles. All evidence points to a failure rate for Amish businesses that is below 10 percent, far lower than the 50 percent and higher estimates for mainstream small-business failures.19 The low Amish default rate is even more remarkable because it includes some business closures related to retirement or migration.
Amish informants confirm that there are very few business failures. An accountant for dozens of businesses said, “I can’t think of any that have failed in our local four or five districts over the past fifteen years.” Likewise, an Amish leader in another settlement, familiar with hundreds of businesses, estimated that fewer than 10 percent fail in the first five years.
Non-Amish professionals who work closely with Amish owners concur. An attorney for hundreds of Amish limited liability companies said, “I don’t know of any Amish business foreclosures in our community. There are sales and transfers to other individuals, but not typical liquidations.” Likewise, a certified public accountant with dozens of Amish clients estimates that 90 to 95 percent of businesses survive beyond five years, a rate that he calls “significantly high.” An official at a bank that has $125 million in loans to Amish small businesses puts their failure/closure rate well below 10 percent. “In the last ten years we never had any of our Amish clients go into foreclosure, nor have we had to force a sale,” he said.
Commenting on businesses in his settlement, one Amish elder noted, “I don’t know of any that filed for bankruptcy. That would be very discouraged and unheard of here.” Yet, although bankruptcy is rare, some businesses do disappear because of financial pressure. Several Amish construction companies folded during the 2008–2009 recession because of the weak housing market. Other small contractors were “on life support and some are owed substantial sums [from non-Amish customers], which are unlikely to be paid,” according to one financial advisor. Some enterprises, such as sawmills and furniture manufacturers, eased production, shortened their work week, or furloughed employees during the recession. One consultant noted that, although low-tech sawmills have been a favorite Amish industry, “now they’re in a major funk. Yet, I know of no mill that has shut down and not paid creditors.” Because most Amish businesses are small and have low debt leverage, they can, as one English observer put it, “adjust very quickly to downsizing and market flux.”
Reasons for business failure include inept management, flimsy products, inadequate capital, changing markets, and tepid product promotion. Some Amish-owned businesses close because they are victims of unscrupulous companies that subcontract with them to produce products and then default on payment, banking on the fact that the Amish will not sue. One conservative Amish farm family in upstate New York accepted a contract to attach baskets to lacrosse sticks. Paid by the unit, they assembled an average of 1,000 sticks each week until the distributer went bankrupt, owing the family several thousand dollars.
When an Amish business does falter to the point of failure, the church may step in to help. Generally, three trustees are appointed to nurse the operation back to profitability or, if necessary, sell it. The local Gmay appoints a trustee, the owner in trouble invites a trustee, and those two select a third one. The trio forms a temporary management team that provides advice and, if necessary, assumes power of attorney and executes corrective measures to rehabilitate the business. This church-based “insurance” provides a form of mutual aid for ailing businesses and underscores the fact that ultimately they exist under the wing of the church.
Success
Why have Amish businesses enjoyed abundant success? Both internal and external factors help to explain their robust growth. Certainly the hardy Amish work ethic and embrace of frugality and austerity are key reasons. Moreover, Amish businesses draw on a readily available pool of ethnic and family labor with shared values and worldview. Limited overhead costs also enhance profitability. Many Amish businesses do not provide commercial health insurance or pension plans for their Amish employees because those ne
eds are covered individually or by the Amish community.
In addition, cultural restraints may, ironically, turn into advantages. The taboo on high school, for example, limits men to three career tracks: farming, business ownership, and wage labor. So the would-be surgeons, pilots, teachers, engineers, and software gurus become entrepreneurs in the Amish world. The lid on formal education has also spurred Amish-style vocational training that immerses youth in informal apprenticeships for lifelong technical, manufacturing, and management positions.
Furthermore, the insistence on small-scale operations keeps businesses small, allowing other Amish entrepreneurs to run similar operations in a limited market region. It is not uncommon for owners of growing businesses to divide their firms or spin off certain product lines to adult children or other employees in order to keep a business within culturally acceptable limits. Such strategic downsizing means that, instead of a handful of large factories that concentrate business wealth in the hands of a few, hundreds of owners enjoy the delights of entrepreneurship. Even those who are employees rather than business owners are close to the action and part of a small-team effort.
Surprisingly, the technological constraints on telephones, public grid electricity, and motor vehicles have also become resources. Communicating by postal mail instead of e-mail, answering phones only at certain hours, and using compressed air instead of electricity accentuate the uniqueness of Amish wares and add cachet for customers wanting a distinctive product.
External factors also favor Amish commerce. For example, on religious grounds, self-employed Amish business owners and their Amish employees are exempt from paying into Social Security (or tapping its benefits). Some states also exempt Amish businesses from participation in workers’ compensation because private church aid covers the costs of members’ job-related injuries. Such exemptions reduce payroll costs for Amish owners and increase their businesses’ profitability.
The strength of regional economies and markets can also help to boost profits. Amish communities located within reach of Chicago, Cleveland, Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia benefit from urban markets hungry for Amish products ranging from food to furniture. Amish-themed tourist markets in the larger settlements attract millions of visitors who relish Amish-made products.
That the Amish are recognizable as a distinctive people also benefits their businesses. The mystique of Amish life creates a branding effect so potent that some English companies use a buggy logo or phrases like “Amish Country” to sell non-Amish products. Like the label Starbucks or the golden arches of McDonalds, the word Amish and the horse-and-buggy emblem perform magic in the marketplace. Similarly, Amish dress standards, which restrict a member’s freedom of choice, also announce the presence of Amish workers at job sites. A federal exemption from the hardhat rule at construction sites—in deference to church tradition—spotlights traditional ethnic headgear and offers eye-catching on-site advertising at no cost.
What does the Amish label mean? It stirs nostalgic feelings for the past—images of early Americana, small neighborhoods, and strong families—and it suggests durable products handcrafted with care by hardworking people. Accurate or not, these meanings embedded in the Amish brand capture the imaginations of consumers. From furniture to food, Amish-made or Amish-associated products carry implied stories of America’s past and of the values of an exotic people who have spurned the modern world. Regardless of its veracity, the Amish brand stokes sentiments that entice consumers.
Gender at Work
Women in all settlements work as employees and entrepreneurs. Although some women work full time, many more have part-time jobs performing cleaning services for English neighbors or working in restaurants, farmers’ markets, and other businesses owned by Amish or non-Amish people. At least 15 percent of Amish-owned businesses in Lancaster County are owned by women.20 As growing children assume more household chores, a mother might begin a small at-home shop for sideline income, as one woman did by starting a small bulk-foods store in her basement. When women start businesses, they typically enter traditionally female occupations: cleaning, baking, sewing, and gardening. This gendered pattern is extending in new directions as some Amish women have become Pampered Chef consultants. Female-owned businesses target either Amish or outside markets, or often both.
An Amish woman in a progressive settlement displays Christmas items in the dried flower shop she owns. An air-powered ceiling fan (left) and a propane light (center) are attached to the ceiling. The cash register is battery powered. Daniel Rodriguez
In many settlements, women have roadside stands selling produce, baked goods, and craft items. In eastern Cattaraugus County, New York, 37 of the 108 Amish shops in a county brochure reflect traditional women’s work—quilts, baked goods, jams and jellies. If a woman’s stand prospers, her husband may use it to sell his woodworking crafts. Businesses such as one offering “quilts, wall hangings, pillows, fruits, vegetables in season, maple syrup, & buggy shop” are likely a joint effort of husband and wife.
One woman bakes cookies in her home for a local restaurant. “Christmas is in high gear at the restaurant,” she wrote. “I work—2 days a week. We’ve been doing Christmas cookies, all kinds. If I understood right, we have 800 doz. … I’ve frosted enough trees and stars to do it in my sleep!” An Amish woman in southeastern Michigan began cleaning houses and then expanded her cleaning service to include businesses, among them several automobile dealerships. Regardless of their specialty, women entrepreneurs contribute significantly to the economic well-being of their families.21 Entering business gives women more access to money and resources and also to the outside world. Women are gaining economic power, perhaps expanding their influence within their own families and communities as well. Some of the Amish business owners in Lancaster County, for example, now employ their husbands.22
On the other hand, changing patterns of employment may actually restrict the role of women in Amish life. Some leaders fret because young fathers employed away from home are unable to work with their offspring or teach them occupational skills and thus mothers must carry a greater burden for child supervision. Furthermore, when married women remain at home while their husbands work outside, the sharp separation between the public realm of men’s labor and the private world of family turns the “two kingdoms” of Amish religion into gendered domains.23
As wage employment outside the community becomes more common for men, it may increase the power of patriarchy in male-female relationships.24 Men become able to engage in secular activities that women, at home with the children, cannot. One young woman noted, for example, that her father often stops for coffee in town, but her mother is seldom able to go away. In addition, wage labor provides men with a tangible regular income and a defined work day, while women, occupied with the never-ending tasks of child rearing, cooking, and cleaning, are less able to point to concrete accomplishments. Thus, it is still unclear exactly how changing work patterns will transform gender roles.
Tradition and Transformation
Unchanging Traditions
Even as occupational change is transforming Amish society in significant ways, many components of Amish life remain stable. New employment venues have not lured Amish people into high school or college, and the line between automobile use and ownership remains firm. Using new technologies in English factories or on construction sites may actually cement, rather than dilute, Amish notions of separateness because these encounters with the fruits of modernity occur on alien turf.
Nor is the family—that keystone of Amish society—necessarily harmed by changing work habits. Sociologist Thomas J. Meyers has shown that there is little difference in the number of children born to the families of farmers, factory workers, and shop owners in northern Indiana. Nor in that same settlement are defection rates different for children of farm and nonfarm families. Likewise, Lawrence Greksa and Jill Korbin found that Amish farm families in Geauga County, Ohio, had slightly higher rates of defection than families
with fathers employed in shops, factories, or construction. Indeed, greater differences emerge among settlements than among the occupational segments within a settlement. Gender, public school attendance, proximity to town, and the Ordnung of their Gmay may all be more influential in an Amish teen’s decision for or against church membership than her or his father’s occupation.25
Work Transforming Culture
Yet economic shifts do have profound implications for Amish life—the use of time, family relationships, access to capital and consumer goods, interaction with the wider world, and one’s sense of self. Increasingly common are church districts with no farmers, vanloads of men working on construction sites miles away from home, and business advertising that mocks the traditional value of humility. While none of the new occupational ventures signals the end of Amish society, they are certainly changing it. These changes bring a host of potential problems and possibilities to be faced by Amish communities as they decide what to preserve and what to concede.
A major consequence of nonfarm employment for both business owners and wage earners is disposable income. Although, in Amish eyes, wealth should not be conspicuously displayed, it nonetheless produces inequality. When firms have grown too large, some church communities have encouraged or occasionally forced owners to sell them to English buyers. But the end result, ironically, can be an ex-owner with now even more money and free time. The Ordnung and community concerns guide how some of that money is spent—channeling portions of it into underwriting Amish school buildings or funding land trusts that provide first mortgages for newly married couples—but the dollars are also used for landscaping, concrete driveways, eating out, second buggies, big-game hunting trips, and motorboats.
Another byproduct of working away from home is leisure time. Unlike farming or small cottage industries, manufacturing and construction jobs have limited hours. Greater discretionary time brings new leisure activities such as fishing, boating, shopping at the local Walmart, traveling, and playing sports—and more time to spend on them. Free time for the children of parents working away from home is also an issue, because the families of day laborers often live on small tracts that may include a horse stable and a tiny pasture, but hardly enough room for a large garden or other outdoor chores to keep young ones busy and out of mischief.
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