By David Mezzapelle

Our history is interesting. From 1986 - 1990 I attended Fairfield University in Connecticut. I was a marketing major. Early in my freshman year I was approached by the Marketing Department to consider an internship at IBM. If it worked out, the internship would last all 4 years and could lead to a bright career path. I accepted.

When I graduated from Fairfield in May of 1990 I decided that I want to start my own company (called Goliath Technology). Thanks to the IBM internship I learned that there was a need for IT integrators and distributors that cater to market niches such as education, banking, healthcare, etc. I took that route and started the company in July 1990. Once we launched, my first order of business was to find the most cost effective way to get into data centers throughout the U.S. and Canada. Normal staffing efforts were cost prohibitive so I had to get creative. I figured that since I was an intern, why not hire interns. I knew I would get motivated people that could learn our culture and potentially stay on full-time after graduation. In addition, I knew the cost savings would be enormous and I could build a great marketing force.

There was no real internet to speak of in 1990 (except Prodigy and young AOL), so I decided to purchase the Barron’s Book Colleges. I created a job posting for a “Campus Intern” and literally faxed it to every school listed in the book. The process took 2 weeks. What happens next changed the course of my career…

I had a 100% response rate. Thousands of schools responded to my fax. At the time it was overwhelming. I had no idea I would get this type of response. An administrator from every school contacted me and said they would post our internship if applicable to their curriculum. Clearly we were on the path to building our marketing force and becoming an industry “Goliath.”

Part 2 of this story is available at http://blog.goliathjobs.com/2007/08/03/my-david-goliath-story-part-2-goliath-growth-with-college-interns/.

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