TV executive gets rewarding lesson in business formation

Over the past few years, HGTV executive Lori Asbury has taken one of her childhood loves – horseback riding – and worked to create a corporation of her own around the pursuit, the Knoxville News Sentinel reports.

She told the paper that she had been looking for an investment – and had considered a restaurant franchise – when another trainer suggested that she should start her own stable. Soon after she started A&A Farms – named after her two children, Aidan and Alexis – in Farragut, Tennessee.

“The more I thought about it, the more passionate about it I got,” Asbury told the paper. “It’s so much fun and so much work. I could not be happier. I have not regretted it.”

Three months after it opened, the News Sentinel reports that the farm already has more than 20 clients and has even had to bring in another trainer to help with lessons.

The farm is an example of the growing role of women entrepreneurs in the U.S. – recent census data says women own 7.8 million current businesses nationwide. That represents a 20-percent increase over the last five years, and means that women own one-in-three companies in the U.S.