The Huffington Post had an article on Saturday titled 5 Things you Need to Know to Start a New Business: Why Right Now is the Perfect Time. I generally find such “5 simple rules for success” articles annoying. I think too many people don’t actually know why they succeeded (or why they failed) to make such lists genuinely useful. Still, the article made me think.

My first thought: In a big downturn, a lot of really good talent winds up out of work. That’s the perfect time to get that talent together and start something. Whether it’s to produce something new or to start a consulting company (many companies are afraid to hire full time right now, even if they have work) is dependent on a lot of factors. The point, though, is to take advantage of the raw numbers of talented people who are out of work right now.

My second thought: I’ve heard stories of groups of artists moving to cities like Detroit. I’m sure there are opportunities for support businesses. Heck, even a good coffee shop with space for artists to exhibit their wares is a potential business. How about an art supply shop? Depending on the size of the communities, there may be advantages to having local distribution.

I tend to think about entrepreneurship using a very limited model of capitalism: there exist opportunities in identifying inefficiencies and figuring out how to eliminate them. While it is very limiting, it is also not how many people think, which is why I’m sharing it. In a downturn, there is a renewed focus on cutting costs. Unfortunately, a lot of the low hanging fruit has already been picked. On the plus side, this means that the costs of starting a business are fairly low (imagine the hassle of doing your own payroll and books without ADP and quickbooks). There are still a lot of wasteful practices in any business. Unfortunately, I couldn’t think of anything concrete.

With a few exceptions, I don’t have a lot of faith in existing companies pulling us out of this recession. We need more entrepreneurs.