FAYETTEVILLE -- A dozen high school students from Northwest Arkansas pitched their business ideas to judges after a week of Entrepreneurship Bootcamp, with one team walking away with $500.
The free camp is run by Startup Junkie, a not-for-profit consulting agency, with the idea of helping young people foster innovative concepts and learn the tools to turn those concepts into reality, said Executive Director Hayley Allgood, who has help put on the camp all four years.
Bootcamp Judges
• Rita Littrell, director of the Bessie Boehm Moore Center for Economic Education in the Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas
• Jeff Amerine, founder of Startup Junkie Consulting
• Tom Douglass, a director for Walmart emerging technology
• Anna Morrison, CEO of Campus Concierge, a tutoring business for college students in Northwest Arkansas
Source: Staff Report
The Indescribable Cupcakes & More team won the prize after wowing the four judges with their concept and message.
Dalton Hopkins, a junior at Springdale High School, said he has been bullied in school for being a person with special needs. Baking with his father lifted his spirits, and he felt a calling to help others like him through this passion, he said.
Hopkins' business will provide homemade cupcakes with creative flavors, such as the cherry bomb with Pop Rocks in the center. He has a goal of hiring employees with special needs to fill 50 percent of the staff, Hopkins said.
Less than 18 percent of people with a disability in the U.S. were employed in 2015, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
"Just because you have a disability, that doesn't mean you can't achieve your goals," Hopkins said. "The biggest problem we are having in our community is finding businesses that hire teens and adults with special needs. We plan on solving that problem."
The business has a Facebook page and a website on the way, and Hopkins and his brother Malachi want to take the money from the competition to help buy commercial tools and equipment for their business. The brothers' plan to have a food truck up and running by mid-September with the ultimate goal to have a brick and mortar franchise, they said.
The other four groups presented business models for language learning and team sports apps, inclusive clothing design and an all-in-one dog care and adoption business.
All the students incorporated numerous concepts such as marketing strategies and budgeting they learned at the camp from Startup Junkie staff and local businesses.
"It's always a pleasure to see young people doing things they are passionate about," said judge Anna Morrison, CEO of Campus Concierge, a tutoring business available to college students in Northwest Arkansas. "I think every single presentation had something impressive."
NW News on 06/30/2018