UBR Spotlight: ULS CEO Charles Sanders On Building A Successful Business

This week on The Urban Business Roundtable, UBR Contributor Renita D. Young speaks with Charles S. Sanders, the founder and CEO of Urban Lending Solutions, about the keys to building a successful business. Based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, banking industry business services company earned revenues of $127 million in 2010 to land at No. 28 on the Black Enterprise 100s list of the nation’s largest Black-owned industrial/service companies.

Sanders went from being a running back with his hometown Pittsburgh Steelers to starting his own company when he founded Urban Settlement Services in 1999. Today, the company, now known as Urban Lending Solutions (ULS), is one the most highly-rated privately held vendor management companies and a certified minority business enterprise providing real estate information products to the mortgage industry.

Under Sanders’ leadership, during the past decade, ULS has seen exceptional growth, becoming a Tier 1 vendor for the nation’s top lenders and earning recognition as a Supplier of the Year by the National Minority Supplier Development Council. Sanders joins the Roundtable to share the challenges and triumphs of building a successful business.

Also, UBR Contributor Samantha Pass speaks with Kevin Grimes, CEO of CFO Leasing, an Atlanta-based consulting firm that specializes in federal contracting. CFO Leasing has helped companies secure more than $500 million in contracts. Grimes, takes a seat at the Roundtable to offer tips on how entrepreneurs can actively and successfully pursue federal contracts.

In addition, in my “Alfred’s Notepad” segment, I talk about the four key areas that every entrepreneur must focus on when it comes to their company’s technology, according to Black Enterprise Multimedia Content Producer Marcia Wade Talbert: social media, security, storage and mobility. Talbert, in her role as editor of the Tech section of Black Enterprise magazine, covers these issues monthly. In addition, a great new resource is the new Technology section at BlackEnterprise.com, that provides entrepreneurs with the tips, tools and strategies they’ll need to use technology to drive revenues, serve customers and grow their businesses.

And finally, every week on UBR, you’ll get motivation and inspiration from author and entrepreneurial icon Farrah Gray, a weekly wrap-up of business news from USA Today business correspondent Charisse Jones, our Patient Investor Report from Ariel Investments and key economic intelligence for small business owners from our UBR economists Derrick Collins and Rasheed Carter.

If you have a question you want answered or a topic you want addressed on The Urban Business Roundtable, connect with me at BE Insider, the social media network for people who are serious about Black Enterprise. You can also find me on Twitter and Facebook.

Alfred Edmond Jr. is the senior VP/editor-at-large of Black Enterprise and the host of the Urban Business Roundtable, a weekly radio show, sponsored by Ariel Investments, airing CST Wednesdays at 8:30 a.m., Thursdays at 6:30 p.m. and Saturdays at 9:30 a.m. on WVON-AM 1690, the Talk of Chicago. You can also listen live online at WVON.com. Check back each week for UBR Spotlight, which features additional resources, advice and information from and about the topics, entrepreneurs and experts featured on the show.