Yes, You Can! How entrepreneurs stuck to the New Year's resolutions they made for their companies

With her four restaurants affected by the shaky economy, Jennifer Sarver, 32, founder of the $3 million San Francisco Soup Co., got creative. "I resolved to diversify our business [in 2003] and start selling our soups wholesale," says Sarver. To do so, her company's central kitchen first had to become a USDA-inspected facility. "We then had to develop packaging processes for selling wholesale and invest in new equipment," explains Sarver. She also found a distributor who delivered to independent grocery stores in the Bay area.

Diversifying her business became her primary focus for the next eight months. "Even though we were making our soups in larger batches, it was our goal to produce the same quality product. In the beginning, however, we had consistency problems," Sarver recalls. "The soups were too thick or too thin."