CEO Emeritus: Wicked Opportunity

JoAnn Elardo immediately saw opportunity when she watched the Berlin Wall fall in November 1989 on television from her home on Long Island, N.Y.

Barely 26 years old at the time, Elardo hopped on a plane to Warsaw, Poland. Speaking no Polish, she opened a retail store in 1991 that sold American-made athletic shoes, paving the way for American sportswear companies into the Eastern Bloc.

By the time Elardo sold her Warsaw-based company AmerSport in 2008, it was notching $30 million in annual sales distributing athletic footwear for Converse, Nike and other popular U.S. brands throughout seven central and eastern European countries with about 200 employees.