CEO Stories: Natalie Mangrum, Maryland Teacher Tutors

With Maryland Teacher Tutors, she combined her love of teaching with her hidden entrepreneur. Her entrepreneurial spirit—seeing a problem and creating a solution—first revealed itself when she was working as a reading specialist in the Baltimore public schools. She devised an alternative to the traditional approach of taking kids out of class and instead had them work with her in small groups or one-on-one.

WORD-OF-MOUTH

A few months later, referrals for tutoring outside of school started coming in based on word of mouth. Mangrum started recruiting fellow teachers to keep up with demand, and she eventually realized she needed to formalize her processes. In 2015, she created her business, Maryland Teacher Tutors, with the intent of keeping it small. But when the phone stopped ringing, Mangrum approached her endeavor with a different mindset, reading about entrepreneurship, networking with fellow entrepreneurs, and devising a strategy for growth.

GROWTH PLANS

After a tough year in 2016, Mangrum started to see things turn around, thanks to a strong presence on social media and once again, strong word of mouth. To this day, she says she has only invested $100 in her business—the minimum needed to open a bank account—and has grown the business so she now has some 45 certified teachers working for the business. Her goal is to expand the business into the mid-Atlantic states and to be the No. 1 tutoring business in Washington DC.