Congratulations Susanne Mariga! - Celebrating Profit First For Minority Business Enterprises
In this interview on John Briggs’ channel, host John Briggs welcomes co‑author Suzanne Mariga to discuss her newly released book Profit First for Minority Business Enterprises. Suzanne shares how writing the book was a collaborative team effort rather than a solitary endeavor, and explains why she chose to focus on outlier minority‑owned businesses that have achieved seven‑figure success instead of relying on conventional statistics that often highlight challenges. She describes the Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) certification, its 51% ownership requirement, and how government contract bidding works—emphasizing the danger of racing to zero profit in low‑margin bids. The conversation then shifts to pricing strategy, using examples like a jewelry store’s bracelet sales, and urges minority entrepreneurs to recognize and charge for the true value they provide, countering internal narratives of scarcity rooted in historical oppression. Suzanne connects these ideas to the Profit First framework, illustrating stewardship of expenses through a parable of servants and talents, and stresses that treating a business as a gift entails wise investment of time and money. The interview concludes with a call to action: listeners can purchase the book via profitfirstforminoritybusiness.com, Amazon, or Barnes & Noble, and a limited‑time bonus offers a closed‑door session with Mike Michalowicz and John Briggs for those who buy three copies. Throughout, both hosts weave personal anecdotes, biblical references, and practical advice to inspire minority business owners to adopt profit‑first principles and sustain their enterprises.
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All right. Hey, welcome everyone. I have a treat for you today. I have my friend Suzanne Moringa on, and she is a fellow Profit First author with me. But the best thing is that her book launches today. I was privileged to get an advanced copy, Profit First for Minority Business Enterprises. And so we're gonna just kind of pick her brain today. And, you know, you're obviously in this Profit First group page. You're familiar with it if you've followed me for any length of time. I think you'll love to hear the different side that Suzanne's taken to these different things. So Suzanne, welcome. First of all, thanks for being here.
Well, thanks for having me. I'm so glad to be joining the league of authors now.
Yeah. So I know we have had people ask in the past about writing a book. Uh, what's your, you know, what's your initial insights as to like how this feels right now? What the process was like?
You know, when I first started writing the book, um, luckily, you know, you had gone before me so I could pick your brain. So I had that advantage from that. But, you know, when I, when I first thought about writing a book, I thought it was something that you do alone, you know, that you literally just go in your darkroom, you type on your computer for hours, and like, you know, you, you, you know, if you're a guy, you just grow facial hair, right? Because nobody sees you for a long time. And, and what shocked me was that it really is a group process. It really is all about the team. Um, you know, like you have your developmental editor, you have copy editors, you have, you know, typographers, you got proofreaders, proofreaders, you got advanced readers, and then your biggest support, you got people like John Briggs supporting you too on this too. So I mean, it definitely wasn't something you do in a dark room the way that I originally had thought that you did.
That's awesome. So just to show you guys again, so my book, my niche I focused on was micro gyms. Suzanne's niche here is minority business. enterprises. I actually wanted to start with Suzanne. I wanted to read something that you put in the book, and I wanted to ask you why you felt like you wanted to put it in here. So you said, when you were conducting interviews for this book, one of the questions that you asked each entrepreneur of color was, what has been your biggest challenge in starting and scaling your business? You expected at least one or two of them to say that it was being accepted in a full room of people who just did not look like them. To your surprise, no one said that. These brilliant entrepreneurs spoke of time management, understanding their financials, and implementing plans as a result of data. Some mentioned people management and just trusting in their own unique spark. No one once mentioned that their hindrance was the color of their skin. I, I, to me, that was a really powerful paragraph, and I'm curious why you felt like including that in this book?
You know, I think that writing a book, and John, you'll probably attest to this too, is you never know how it's going to end, right? It's, it's a journey that, you know, the universe takes you on to come to a conclusion. In some ways, it's like a scientific experiment, right? The book eventually unravels to you. And, and one of the things that when I first started the book, you know, I was very tempted to fill it with statistics, you know, because You know, that's what the world throws at minority-owned business and people of color is statistics, right? Like, you know, like how we do compared to non-minorities, you know, how much we make compared to non-minorities, what our success is. And I was, as I was digging in these statistics, I said, you know what, these are not motivational, right? These are not motivational. And obviously, there are success stories that fall outside of the statistics, right? Because, you guys know, you know, there's a bell-shaped curve, right? And there's a median. And then the others on these sides are these outliers, right? And, and so I said, you know, instead of studying the statistics about everything that goes wrong, why not study the outliers? Why not study the people that have killed it, right? They have grown these 7-figure businesses and figure out what have they done differently, right? And, and particularly minority-owned business that supposedly had every single odd against them, right? They are Gen 1 to start a business. They inherit this wealth. You know, they nobody passed this down to them. Literally, what did they do differently to really pivot and become Gen One millionaires? Right? And and so literally, you know, it was interesting because I had this hypothesis starting out with stats and things like that. And you know, I said, you know what? One or two of these people have to say, you know, color my skin. You know, because that's what the whole world tells us. You know, the color of our skin is stopping us from getting contracts or doing what we need to do. And it was to my surprise that. nobody said that. Nobody said that. Everybody said, you know, it was learning to understand my numbers. It was learning to manage people, right? Because you guys are scaling entrepreneurs. John's been helping you through that. And, you know, scaling people, scaling a business is tough, right? They talked about just trusting in their own unique, unique standpoint, right? Their own unique spark. But nobody said it was the color of their skin. And I thought that was really, really interesting and something that really needed to be brought out because You know, in this century and this year, you know, yes, you know, discrimination does happen, things do happen, but there has never been a better opportunity to really level the playing field and go after the things that you want. There's never been. And really, instead of studying the failure, studying the statistics, right, let's study the outliers and see what they did right. And let's focus on that and grow based upon that.
Very good. That's awesome. Suzanne and I both are believers of the Bible. And it's funny, as you're talking about those things, my thought went to what we're taught about pride and how pride isn't necessarily the feeling of like, I am trying to better myself. Pride is when I say I'm trying to better myself so that I can think that I'm myself, I'm better than someone. So pride comes in a comparison act. And it is interesting how oftentimes if we are looking at the wrong comparative data, it can lead us down probably a wrong path. So I thought that was really interesting. I did like that part in your book. You're like, I'm not going to include statistics. I had a similar chapter in my book about believing it, like what story are you believing? And so I love that you're not sharing like, hey, here's a story or narrative that exists right now in the media, but the reality is with the things that you teach in your book, anyone can be successful, including minority business owners. So I love that so much. So I know that your background, you've worked with a lot of nonprofits and government contracting. Why did you feel the calling to write this book for the minority business entrepreneur?
You know, a lot of times people don't realize that the MBE is actually a certification and they have a woman-owned business certification. And what the certification typically allows you to do, and it's, first of all, you have to be 51% owned by an ethnic minority or 51% owned by a woman. what they believe are these disadvantaged groups, right? And, and what it allows you to do is to compete upon certain government contracts, whether you act as a prime, meaning that you are responsible for the entire contract, or even as a subcontractor, right? And for you guys, MicroGems, you know, you may end up doing contracts with the police department, right, and providing workout facilities. So this may even be something interesting for you in the book to get, right? And, and so what it does is that The interesting part about this request for proposal process is, right, is that it's a bid, right? It's a bidding process, meaning that you put your best work into this proposal, you write it out, and like you literally bid against, you know, another MBE, right? Your neighbor, right? And the winner is, get this, John, the winner is the one that can get closest to zero, right? That's the winner of a bid contract, right? So in effect, you know, what happens when you have a race towards zero, right? Eventually, the race towards zero is free, right? That's literally the winner of this. And so really, you know, what the book talks about is that not all contracts are good contracts, right? Not— and a lot of times, you know, it's kind of like a moth to a flame, you know, a lot of these businesses see these million-dollar contracts, right? Because, you know, it can be a million-dollar contract. But what that means is that if you're pricing it so close to cost, which, you know, from working with clients that do do a lot of work in the government realm, you know, what happens is, you know, yes, you may be dealing with millions of dollars in revenue, right? Yes, you may be dealing with multi-seven-figure contracts, right? Especially if you're in construction or that type of business. But in a day, you're dealing with million-dollar losses too, right? And, and so, you know, this is a very relevant thing because at the end of the day, yes, the government benefits. Yeah, hopefully the citizens benefit. But at the end of the day, you know, it's at your expense, your line of credit, your inability to grow. Because if you're focusing on your low-margin clients, you're not going to have the opportunity to get the higher-margin ones, right?
Yeah, and that's so good, and that's such a great concept that's applicable across industries. I mean, gym owners struggle with this a lot of times. The squeakiest wheel in the gym who's complaining about things are usually the members who aren't paying the most. They're not doing the extra, uh, services. They're not paying for nutrition, not paying for personal training. They're just like, you know, that one person. And certainly gym owners struggle with the same idea of valuing what they offer, the quality of what they offer. So I did want to go deeper into that because I did make a note. I noticed a good portion of your book, you are encouraging your readers to think about understanding their value, their pricing. You even get into the volume of sales needed. I think you used a jewelry store example. You're like, look, you know how many $5 bracelets you have to sell to make a living? Like, I'm not gonna— I'm not gonna— I don't get pleasure out of shooting down your dreams, but let's think through this a little bit. And then I think you also mentioned like, let's focus on competing on quality, not racing to the bottom. So can you elaborate more on that for us?
Yeah. You know, it's interesting. And I think it's very particular to minority-owned businesses, particularly. One, you know, being Gen 1, just not knowing what we don't know, right? And, you know, if crafts are your thing, that's your thing. You know, I think of like one of my favorite restaurants that I go to in Houston, and the line wraps around the building. You can always see these jewelry vendors. And I'm like, man, did you make enough to cover your wage today after your cost of goods sold? But I think there's also a mindset aspect to it too, John, just like you mentioned, you know, as minority-owned businesses, We are, like you said, we're the stories that we tell ourselves, right? And a lot of times what happens is, you know, if you're a person of color, especially if you've got a background that may include slavery or that type of thing, you know, you know, like my family, you know, literally, you know, historically, we as people, as people of color, have been treated like second-class citizens. And you can't allow those stories, you know, those stories at some point do impact your self-esteem. That's just the reality of it. And really, it's about taking ownership over your value. You know, one of the stories that I, I started out with at the beginning of the book is, you know, just sitting at the dinner table and my parents saying, you know, you know, you're Black, you know, you're gonna have to work twice as hard just to be able to sit at the table. And I remember just, you know, this is a common story that's told, you know, Condoleezza Rice, or it wasn't kind of— it was Michelle Obama, right? Michelle Obama actually mentions in her documentary that she was told a very similar story. So this is a very common story. But the problem is better is always a moving target, right? Better is always a moving target. Best is always a moving target, right? And so, you know, really the first part about embracing profit first, right, is realizing that what you bring to the market is valuable, right? Somebody wants that. And, you know, and if you continue to cut your own ankles by not charging an appropriate price just to get the business just to get the revenue through the door, at the end of the day, you're continuing to supply a system that has traditionally kept people of color down.
Yeah. I think that's really powerful. As a white male who's been privileged my entire life, it's like I don't understand how that psychology— like, that doesn't exist in my life. I can see the logic of how that story is getting told over and over over dinner tables, how it can affect people. And so, yeah, there's a lot of value in understanding that you have value internally and what you are offering in the marketplace has value. And there's no reason you can't charge for that value. One of our core values at our company is value exchange. So I'm always big on this idea. If you want this, this is what I'm willing to exchange it for, right? And, you know, as a business, a lot of times that's dollars. But you have to put value on what you offer, and you have to think through like so for our specifically our minority gym owners who may be listening. Just because what you're doing has an element of charity to it because you're improving the life of humanity, you have to actually realize that's probably one of the most valuable things you can do. You're giving the gift of health through your services, and so now all your members live longer. can be more active with their children. Just across the board, there's so much value that you offer. And so don't ever minimize that and don't ever like just accept a lower price because you think you have to do it to get the business.
Exactly. It just perpetuates a system that continues on. And so it's really just acknowledging your worth, right? And that's the beginning. The beginning, right, John, is just taking your profit first. Right.
Yeah. Let's take the first step. Let's stop paying all of our bills first. With that note though, I loved at the end of your book, you started talking about expenses equals stewardship. Tell me about that.
You know, it's interesting. And I think this goes back to, Jon, like you said, we have that religious background, right? That Christian background. And it goes back to, and it doesn't matter really what your faith is. You know, at the end of the day, your business is your gift. And it's the impact that the universe has called you to make your impact in the world. And we're all going to have a different spark. You know, we're all going to have a different talent. Like, like John is amazing at micro gyms and gyms. And I'm like, man, if I get there 5 times a year, I'm doing good. You know what I mean? I'm doing good. I probably shouldn't be confessing that. But I do have a gym membership though. I do pay a monthly fee. But you know, we all have an amazing spark and talent and that, and our businesses are that vehicle for us to express that, you know, at the end of the day. And so it's just really, you know, just really just in order to be responsible with any gift, right? And I love the parable that I give in that chapter. I give the parable about the wealthy man. He has 3 servants. And one servant, you know, he has been studious, he studied his master. And when his master goes away, he says, you know what, the master said, I'm gonna give you 5 bags of gold. And this guy doubles it, right? And then you got the one that's in the middle. I call him the middle brother, right? He's been watching his big brother. The master gives him 2 bags of gold and he even doubles it. And then there's this 3rd servant, right, who literally is like living in scarcity. He's afraid, right? We all know somebody like that, right? That is, you know, they have the big dream, but they won't take a step on it, right? They won't make the decisions that they know they need to make. They keep living in the same cycle. Well, this guy got 1 bag of gold and he hid it, right? He hid it in the ground. And when the master came back, he's like, What you got to show for it? And the guy's like hiding from him. He's like, well, I hid it in the ground. He goes, you should at least put it in the bank in interest. And our businesses are the same way, right? We can grow our businesses by making wise decisions, by looking at what's the return on investment for each expense. Or we can literally just hide our talent, keep giving away our profit, keep funding the government through, through low bids, right? Or we can make a different decision and pivot our direction.
Yeah, so it's interesting, the King James Version of that story, instead of saying bags of gold, uses the word talent, which was a monetary— just like we use like quarters and dimes nowadays, a talent was kind of a monetary thing back then. But I like the double play on words because talent also refers to skills and things we've been given. And I absolutely believe that if you've been given something and you don't use it, you will lose it. Um, I mean, so in that particular example, the guy who hid his one talent, I love how you've paired— like, he's living in scarcity. Look, as a business owner, you cannot live in scarcity. You have, you have got to get over that. If you live that way, you have to think of the world as an abundance. It's not a finite pie. Don't think of it as, especially for gym owners, like, oh, there's, I don't know, 10,000, 100,000 people in this area. And if I don't, if my competitor gets one of those, that's one less person for me to get. You can't think about it that way. Think about it like the other servants in the story where they said, okay, what you gave me, I'm going to do my best to share it. And by sharing it, it will grow. And that, as you mentioned, the stewardship is what we have over our businesses. So as we share our talents through our businesses, then it's going to grow within us. And guess what? Our capacity to share even more increases. And so I love that message because I want all business owners to realize that the world needs you. They need you to stay in business, which is why, you know, Suzanne's book is super important because it talks about how do you keep that money so that you can stay in business.
Yeah. Exactly. And I love that parable too. Like you said, John, like about the talent, you know, it's, you know, it's just amazing. It's not just money, it's your time, right? And how you're investing your time because, you know, there's $1,000 an hour work and there's $100 an hour work too, right? And just knowing how you're spending your time in order to really grow that bottom line and that impact in the world.
Very cool. Um, so Suzanne, Give us any final inspiring message you want to share, and then please let us all know how we can help with your book launch, where we can go to buy it, how we can share with others.
Yeah. You know, I would say I'm going to close it the way the book kind of closes itself, right? And I love Simon Sinek, and Simon Sinek wrote a book, Start with Why, right? And I think when you're running your business, you know, one of the things that you have to think about even before you begin, you know, even before you begin each day, is at the end of the day, what does winning look like for you, right? What does winning look like for you? What is success at the end of the day for you? When you die, right, what is the memory that you want to leave behind? And once you can paint that picture, once you know what winning looks like, then you design the steps to get to that, right? You decide on the business that works around those end goals. So start with why would be my biggest piece of advice that I would leave with today. And then to get the book, you know, you can go to profitfirstforminoritybusiness.com or you can go to Amazon or Barnes Noble and look for Profit First for Minority Business Enterprises. So I'll show up my book right here. Yours looks like more pinkish than mine. But yeah, so definitely check out the book. It's on sale today. We do have the bonuses where if you buy 3 books today, you will get in a closed-door session with Mike Michalowicz and I. And we're going to literally talk about writing a book. We're going to talk about, you know, what my experiences were writing the book. I'm sure, you know, John may have talked about it too, but always good to get a second thought, right? Things I would have done differently with it. And we're literally closing that door because we're— I told everybody, it's like I get a little overwhelmed when there's too many people in the room, right? Even if it's on Zoom. So if I had to go beyond a screen, it would probably we're going to shut it off. So definitely get your bonuses today, order those 3 books, get those bonuses, and join us in the room, right?
Awesome. Thank you so much for your time today and the message of your book. I think it's really powerful. Obviously, we're fans of Profit First, but what I love about the different specific topic Profit First books is it does, it is written specifically for that audience because there are different needs, just like the Micro Gym audience had a different need than the generic Profit First audience. Your audience of minority business entrepreneurs or enterprises, it's a different tone and spin that they need to think about. But ultimately, the world needs you to stay in business, people. And so do that. And the best way to do that is to take your profit. So remember, profit is a choice. Have the courage and wisdom to choose it. Thanks, everyone.
Thank you, John.
