David Smith rarely has trouble leaving the office in a corner of his Over-the-Rhine apartment to venture out into the real world of work. Most days, he can't wait to get out.

        Mr. Smith, who scavenges each day for vintage designer furnishings for his Main Street gallery, does not see himself as someone who works at home, even though his DesignSmith Gallery is just a staircase away from his kitchen.

        Instead, he says, he has a home-based business. It's a small point but a significant one to Mr. Smith, who plans to soon set up a room screen between his home-office and apartment so the computer is not so omnipresent when he's not working.

        As a slack economy grips the lives of a growing number of workers, many people have found new careers by spurning corporate jobs and a regular salary to create niche companies in their homes.

        “Most mornings, I do work at the desk, but then I'm gone,” he says. His time is spent scrounging for deals or selling and shipping retro-chic accessories from the 1950s-1970s.

        Mr. Smith's forte is mid-century modern. His gallery — and cyber-gallery at designsmithgallery.com — this month boasted a Gino Sarfatti pendant lamp that looked like a satellite, a swooping arc lamp by Achille Castiglioni that sold in two days and smoke-colored glass pendant lamps by Tapio Wirkkala from Finland.

        Prices can get steep. One lamp recently sold for $795. The Castiglioni piece sold for $995. There are also Italian ashtrays, Swedish candleholders, Italian pitchers and a big array of clocks. He has sold pieces to international auction houses like Christie's, Treadway Gallery and Paris-based Phillips, de Pury & Luxembourg.

        “If I had a nine-to-five job, I'd work a lot less,” he said. “I probably work 60 to 80 hours each week and tend to work seven days a week. I've got it in my blood. No matter what I do, I'll always be buying and selling.”

Thriving home business sector
               Few know the size of the American home-based business sector. While many think that the number is north of 20 million and rising, others are uncertain.

        The American Association of Home-Based Businesses, a trade association based in Rockville, Md., projects that more than 24 million Americans work from a home-based office.

        But Dun & Bradstreet, the world's leading provider of business information, has no statistics on the size of the sector, and officials there will not offer a guess.

        Federal officials do not have an inkling, either.

        “We don't have hard data on that,” said John McDowell, public liaison specialist for the federal Small Business Administration's office of advocacy. “We have estimates, but they are couple of years old.”

        Still, he says, it is doubtful that 24 million people work out of their house.

        Sutton Landry, director of the Small Business Development Center at Northern Kentucky University, says the center's Secrets to Starting a Small Business program averages more than 25 people each session, and that number has been constant for about 15 years.

        The other how-to offering here, a three-week series of weekly sessions called Building a Better Business is full for February, and reservations are being taken for a session that starts March 21 at the Covington Public Library.

Home business drawbacks
               While some aspects of home-based businesses are attractive to a would-be businessman or woman, there are challenges, too. The risk may be lower because there is no office to rent or lease but there is a big drawback, as well.

        “Your company is invisible,” Mr. Landry said. “Nobody is going to let you put a sign in your front yard. There are marketing challenges and marketing expenses that you might not have if you were out leasing space.”

        Some companies are created because an individual figures he does not have a lot of choices. Jeffrey M. Seal, owner of Allen-Joseph, a marketing communications company based in Mr. Seal's house in Covington, ventured out on his own last year when he left a Springdale Web-creation and marketing communications company.

        That firm was in transition after owner John Harris passed away, and Mr. Seal figured it was a good time to start his own company.

        “It was always something that was down-the-road, but it was something I wanted to do,” Mr. Seal said. He said he found inspiration in his late boss, who worked out of his home for about two years before he, too, found office space and began to hire employees.

        “Having the owner of your company die forces you to assess your career and suddenly farther and farther down the road becomes right now,” he said.

Internet influence
               Internet technology allows home-based companies to flourish as a customer base is not limited to locale. It can also mean that in order to survive, a home-based business no longer must run uphill to win a race against larger companies that are headed downhill.

        The Commerce Department announced last week that half of all Americans now use the Internet with about two million more coming online for the first time each month. The 143 million people who used the Internet in September, the last month that figures were available, is a 33 percent increase from three years ago.

        The Internet has more than tripled Mr. Smith's annual revenues, he said. Mr. Smith sells items in Japan, Hong Kong, South Africa, Europe and Great Britain, though most customers are in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York.

        “Without the advances of technology in the last five to 10 years, there would not be nearly as many free agents,” says Matthew Fenton, founder of Ninja BrandBuilding. “It has made it infinitely easier for a guy like me to do my thing.”

        Mr. Fenton created this brand marketing consultancy in his home in 1997 and kept the company alive while working full-time for about a year for CoActive Marketing Group.

        Mr. Fenton, who has 12 years' experience in brand development, left CoActive in July to devote himself full-time to Ninja BrandBuilding, a business based in a bedroom in his Columbia Tusculum rehabilitated house.

        Clients include Hershey Foods Corp.; Amurol Confections Corp.; and Xemex Co., a fashion watch company that makes timepieces that cost $1,000 to $5,000.

        His equipment is basic: a printer, a personal computer, a telephone and a Palm Pilot.

        “Being alone can be a challenge, but two or three days a week, I'm out with clients,” he said.

        “The biggest challenge is getting pulled away from getting work done. Nobody is there to tell you to sit at your desk. Nobody tells you to take exactly an hour for lunch,” Mr. Fenton said.

        “But I found that if you love what you do, you get out of bed wanting to do it. Getting the work done takes care of itself.”

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