Elevate Springfield

Elevate Springfield featuring Elijah, Emery, and Sophia: Elevating Through the Power of Entrepreneurship

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 33:56

Send us Fan Mail

Summary

The conversation revolves around the New Venture Challenge, where high school seniors pitch their business ideas. Elijah shares his journey of creating a running apparel brand, Emery discusses his trash can cleaning service, and Sophia introduces her edible cookie dough business. Each student highlights their motivations, challenges, and future aspirations, showcasing the entrepreneurial spirit fostered by the Sangamon CEO program.

Takeaways

  • Elijah's passion for running inspired his business idea.
  • Creating a brand that resonates with runners is key.
  • Instagram was crucial for marketing and sales.
  • Networking and connections are vital for young entrepreneurs.
  • Emery's trash can cleaning service addresses a unique need.
  • Sophia's edible cookie dough offers a healthier alternative.
  • Understanding your market is essential for success.
  • Persistence is important in entrepreneurship.
  • Feedback from peers can help refine business ideas.
  • The Sangamon CEO program provides valuable experiences and connections.

Join The Elevate Insider:

https://bigdogbc.com/elevate

Facebook:  @robertferriell   @elevatespringfield

Youtube: @robertferriell

10X Health:  https://10xhealthnetwork.com/BIGDOG

SPEAKER_03

Welcome to Elevate Springfield, where we will dive into strategies and stories that help you rise to your full potential. Each episode, we'll talk about how you can take intentional steps to elevate your life and your business while making a meaningful impact on those around you. Along the way, we're gonna bring in the change makers from our community that are already elevating. We'll bring the actionable strategies, you bring the discipline and follow through, and together, we can elevate Springfield. Alright, let's go, Springfield. Time to 10X your life, your business, all of it. Time to crush those goals, time to get after it. Let's go. You are listening to the Elevate Springfield Podcast. Robert Farrell here, certified 10x coach, speaker, and mentor here to bring you actionable strategies. You bring the discipline and follow through. And together, we're going to Elevate Springfield. We're coming to you again from beautiful downtown Springfield in the Big Dog Construction Studio. Hey, we've got so much going on in Springfield right now. Make sure you are participating. Get out there, network with folks, be a part of the community, support local businesses, support local nonprofits, and let's go, we can all grow together. So, hey, another great episode for you today. We're gonna get right to our guest after the break. Hey, Springfield, when it comes to reliable, high-quality roofing, you don't want to leave things to chance. That's why you should reach out to Acosta Angeli Roofing, your local roofing expert serving Springfield and surrounding communities. From quick, dependable repairs to full replacement, from residential to commercial. They are your trusted pros. Call them today at 217-993-2748 or visit their website to book your free quote and inspection. Don't wait. A little leak now could lead to major damage later. Trust the local experts, protect your home, and get peace of mind with Acosta Angeli Roofing. And we are back joining me in the studio right now. I have three folks with me that participated in a really cool competition last week. The new venture challenge through the Sangaman CEO program. So I've got three high school seniors here that won the top three out of that challenge last week. So I'm excited to let you guys know about their businesses and a little bit about them. First one, we have Elijah. Elijah, how are we doing, man? Doing great. Just ready to ready to roll, talk about the business. Yeah. So you actually won, right? Yeah, yeah. I got you took birth place. There you go. Nice. So before we talk about your business, let's learn a little bit about Elijah.

SPEAKER_02

Tell me a little about you, man. Um, I am a senior at Pleasant Plains, and my name is Elijah Tafey. I run quite a bit. I do cross country and tracks. So that's kind of the reason behind the business, how it even started, because I have quite a passion for running, and then I'm going on to run at uh the Division I level, which is at University of Southern Indiana. So that'll be a really good time. I'm gonna go study business as well, further the uh further the business, and it's gonna be it's gonna be a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_03

Awesome, awesome. Congrats on running at the D1 level there. How long have you been running?

SPEAKER_02

I have been running since I didn't really take it too seriously in middle school. I did track and cross country, but in high school I realized I was pretty decent at it, so I wanted to take it and keep going with it.

SPEAKER_03

What all events do you do? So tracking.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so cross country is just everybody does the same thing, three mile race, depending on what state you're in, you do 5K. But in high school, I do the mile and two mile, and that's kind of what I specialize in more. Sometimes throwing an 800 just to if I'm feeling fast. Okay. Yeah. So you feel like you're gonna do the same type of events when you're yeah, so in college they get the events get quite a bit longer. There's actually an on-track 10K, which I don't find myself doing unless unless I figure out I'm pretty good at it. I don't know. Uh, so I'll probably stick to the events switch a little bit. It's like the 1500 instead of the 1600, and uh it gets pretty complicated with it. But distances are about the same. Okay.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. Awesome. Well, good luck, man. Yeah, it's gonna be fun.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

So uh Sangaman CEO. Why'd you decide to take the program? For those out there that don't know what Sangaman CEO, it's an entrepreneurship-based program. Uh, really, seniors take it here in Sangamon County. School students from all over the area from all the different high schools can take it. But why did you decide to do Sangaman CEO?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so my junior year and honestly, actually, it started my freshman year. I had a buddy on the cross-country team named Nathan Dahl, and he took it and he really enjoyed it. And then the year after that, I had a buddy named Jack Willenborg. He also took it and really liked it. And every single year I heard good feedback about it, good positive feedback, and I was like, I might as well spend my time doing something, and it gets me out of school for a little bit and also looks good on the resumes and everything, good experience, good connections, and everything. So I only heard positive stuff about it. So I was like, might as well give it a shot. And I was already looking to start a business before I even started it, anyways.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. Well, with that, start your own business. That's a big part of the part of the program. That's what the new venture challenge was. You guys are essentially pitching your new businesses. Either they are already started or you're just kickstarting them, right? So let's learn a little bit about the winning business here, man. Tell us about it.

SPEAKER_02

Okay. So before CEO started, I kind of was thinking, I kind of want to start a business that's somewhat running related because there's a lot of apparel brands that are associated with other sports, but not really that represent running. There's a lot of corny t-shirts about running and stuff like that. If you can look them up, it's pretty bad. Uh but I was thinking, why not create a brand that runners can wear? And because clothes are an extension of a lot of people's identity, runners can wear it and show what they do, what they pour their life into. So I was thinking, why not make an apparel brand? So I, you know, got the manufacturer. Actually, my connections, Nathan Dahl, he uh he actually has his business going right now, the four-show golf apparel, and that was he's doing really well with that. So I cut to him, saw if he could help me out, and he helped me get manufacturer and what to design on and everything like that. So he was really helpful. And actually executing it was being on Instagram, social media, and stuff like that, not being afraid to talk on a camera and advertise your business. And yeah, it it's it's been a lot of fun. The process has been fun. Getting some friends to wear it, some local Illinois guys to wear it, but then also seeing like waking up in the morning seeing, oh, some guy in Georgia just bought my t-shirt. That's kind of fun. That's kind of like I'll just get a random person buy it, and it's like, okay, so they actually think it's cool, they they think it's product worth their uh worth their money. So yeah, it's it's been a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_03

So you say a lot of the stuff that's out there could have been cheesy. But what makes your stuff different?

SPEAKER_02

So if you take a look at stuff, it'll be like like keep calm and run on or something like that. A little corny. And so I'll put something like I wish I had it on, but something that actually could be compared to today's fashion. So something like a graphic tee or something. I looked at things that people were already wearing and then putting like a running kind of twist on it, making it correlate to running a little bit more rather than just be a random shirt with some graphics on it. So I tried to not have it as be as corny as some of the other shirts, but then also have it be running related as well, so people feel like they're a part of something.

SPEAKER_03

So is it more like performance apparel, like material-wise?

SPEAKER_02

Material-wise is actually more like everyday wear, like street wear. So I could wear it while I was running for easy runs, but it's more so just like everyday wear, street wear, kind of just more stylish, but I've learned it to run.

SPEAKER_03

But yeah. You've sold quite a bit so far. So, what have you been your most effective marketing tools for it?

SPEAKER_02

Definitely Instagram. Instagram has gotten me to sell essentially all of my products. So I actually got on at first and I would just post, oh, new t-shirt dropping. Nothing. Nothing, nobody bought anything. I'm like, what is going on? And then Nathan Doll's like, well, you actually gotta show people what you're selling. Like, they don't want to be like, oh, there's a t-shirt because everybody's trying to sell t-shirts. But and then I got into more like explaining the story and got people's emotions behind it and showed runners like this is something that you guys could be a part of. And once I started uh actually telling the story about it, I started getting more views, I started getting more people saying, Oh, this is actually pretty cool. And then then sales came in. So it was it was a while without any reward, which felt kind of like a little bit of a drought, and like, why am I even doing this? But then once I started doing it right, it actually started translating into sales and it was pretty, pretty uh great.

SPEAKER_03

That's good, that's good. So other people wearing your stuff, do you use that as marketing for yourself?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so like I would post on my story. So the Rochester Rockets wore the shorts that I had designed. It was just a coincidence that I made a rocket ship design, and then three weeks later the Rochester girls are going to state for cross country. So I said, Hey, do you guys want because there's a lot of teams look for fun, different jerseys for the state finals. And I was like, You guys want a 25% discount off of the shorts if you guys all buy them for the team? And we had one girl in the CEO class that helped me get that connection through, and they ended up wearing them there. So that was a good moment. That's a good uh marketing strategy and being like, hey, we have state finals teams wearing this stuff. Post that on my story that shows that people are like, this is a legit brand. People are people are wearing this. You're gonna actually get the product if you order it. So it was uh it was cool. It was that that was honestly one of the cooler ones to see just like a group of people wearing it and feeling like they're uh a part of something. That's what I intended it to be for.

SPEAKER_03

I love it. I love it. So we haven't said the name of the company yet. What is it called, man?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so it's called Speedies. I was thinking about it. I I made the logo before they actually made the name of the company. I was like, I made the logo, it's like a pair of shorts and then little lines and it's like moving forward. I was like, what should I call it? Speedies. That was that was just the name I thought. I was like, that's a nice ring to it.

SPEAKER_03

So yeah. So walk me through your pitch. Last week, what was it, Thursday? Yeah. I think we had you had the uh new venture challenge where you we had a lot of judges in there. I was one of the judges. You go in and you you pitch your company to these folks, and then you you had a live pitch later on. But but how do you pitch your company to these people?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so I first start like try to get people's emotions behind it. That's what that kind of the whole presentation was supposed to be about, like show the story and not the actual just like robotic pitch. It's like this is sales, this is this. So I started out with saying if you take a look at football, basketball, soccer, and everybody like all these other sports, they have jerseys that people wear that make them feel a part like a part of the sport, and then they have other apparel. And then I went on to running and showed like that there's really just kind of not a great market for any sort of apparel uh associated with running. And then I had a a slide with a bunch of the corny shirts that said like keep calling run on, and then like a bunch of corny shirts about like uh I run for fun and stuff like that. So I showed that, and then I got them the idea that running apparel can be more than just that, and what my process in designing it was, I had to show the sales, I had to show uh the way that I advertised it, which was mostly Instagram, and then the numbers were good to show the judges because my numbers have been pretty good on Instagram, like getting a couple uh 8,000 followers on there just in the span of like two months. So that's been that's been good. So after showing them that running didn't have something like that, I could show them my progress and how I got to where I am. I guess that was pretty convincing, and then the sales were pretty good. So that was I guess that ultimately got me the win.

SPEAKER_03

Well, congrats on all your success so far with it. Thank you. Appreciate it. What's the plan moving forward? You just said you're going to college. Yeah. So are you gonna continue on with the business and go to college at the same time? What are you gonna do?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so over this summer, since I have all day to actually work on the business, I actually took an internship with Nathan Dahl, as I talked about earlier, with his business for show apparel. And he said that that would be very helpful for me to just be hands-on with a business that's actually very successful. There's levels to it. Like mine I would consider doing all right, but then his is doing very well. So I would learn hands-on to help them with their social media because I do well in the social media aspect of it, but then also like following up with emails and saying, like, oh, do you want to try this product and that product? So I haven't been on that, but just learning more about it and then continuing it over the summer, and then hopefully once I get to college, since it's more of a uh print on demand type of business, I don't have to keep a bunch of hoodies and t-shirts. Yeah, I'm not gonna do it. So that's very nice. So I honestly, there's really no loss for me to keep continue the business. So I will do that into college and see if the sport takes up too much of my time. If it does, uh I'll probably drop it and see if I can do social media and continue to do that for longer because that doesn't really require a ton of different sets of skills because talking to a camera and stuff like that. But yeah, no, continue the business as long as I can. If it's successful, I'll who knows, make it a career if that if that if it gets to that. Yeah. There you go.

SPEAKER_03

Love it. Any advice for other young entrepreneurs out there?

SPEAKER_02

You're gonna fail a ton of times and nobody's gonna buy your product like right at the very beginning. Because a lot of people say, I got this advice actually from Nathan Dahl. He said a lot of people are gonna say, hey man, when it comes out, I'm gonna buy it. And uh it's a lot of people don't. They don't, yes. Yeah, just don't bank on this person's gonna buy it, this person's gonna buy it, and don't keep a tally of people that you think uh that said they were gonna buy it and expect them to because you're not running like a charity. So try to get people that actually really want your product and not just be like, hey, that's my buddy, I'm gonna buy it. So yeah, just don't bank on people verbally telling you that they're gonna buy it before. So because that can be dangerous. Cause I was I was like sad. I was like, oh man. Yeah, feel hit, yeah, feel that hit. Oh yeah. I was like, I worked hard on this. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

But well, if somebody out there right now wants to go buy something, where do they go? Speedies.shop. Yeah, I kind of try to keep it simple.

SPEAKER_02

And uh it's on the Instagram, it's linked in the bio, and yeah, that's the website, speedies.shop. There you go.

SPEAKER_03

I'm gonna go get me something. All right, let's go see what I can find on there. All right.

SPEAKER_02

Well, Elijah, appreciate you spending some time with me. All right, thank you. I appreciate me uh being on here.

SPEAKER_03

Absolutely. Well, we're gonna get to the second place winner, but we're gonna let Elijah get back to elevating Springfield. Yeah, that's what that's the goal. There you go. Thank you. Appreciate it. Be right back. All right, and we are back. We've got our second place winner of the new venture challenge. Emory is joining us now. Emory, how you doing, man? Doing good, happy to be here. Hey, well, I'm excited to hear more about your business because uh I don't think I judged yours last year. No, no. No, I don't think I didn't judge any of yours, I don't believe. So when I was judged last week. So I'm excited to learn more about you guys. So, Emory, before we learn about your business, uh, tell us a little bit about you, man.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, I'm a senior at Sacred Heart Griffin High School here. I'm uh going to Ole Miss next year and majoring in finance. In high school, I played football all three years, uh, transferred from Pleasant Plains after my freshman year to SHG and had a blast at SHG and ready to go to college now.

SPEAKER_03

There you go. What'd you play football?

SPEAKER_04

What position do you play? I was DN. Okay. I was yeah, I started at receiver, but eventually you learn you can't catch the ball after somebody dropped passes. So I got moved to D-line and loved it. Loved being second.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, there you go. Throwing that Miles Garrett on folks out there. Uh-huh. Yeah. All right.

SPEAKER_04

All right. Why old miss? Yeah, as my sister's down there right now. I had a cousin that went down there a couple years ago. There's it's such a blast down there. It's so fun. I mean, between the connections you make and just the city itself, it's a great atmosphere, great culture. It's just a really cool place.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. So I I asked Elijah the same thing. Why'd you pick pick CEO? Why'd you do that program this year?

SPEAKER_04

I'm kind of lazy. I'm not gonna lie. I don't have a great story like Elijah. Uh it takes up two class periods, right? So rather than sitting in two different classes in the morning at school, I can come out here and meet some new people, make me some new connections, don't have a final. Right. So I was like, all right, it sounds good. Yeah. Worst case scenario, you know, I actually take them away from this class. Right, right. But uh yeah, it's that really was why.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. So a big part of the program is going out to businesses or having businesses come and visit you. How impactful was that for you this year, getting to meet all those different people?

SPEAKER_04

Definitely. It was huge, it was amazing. Um, making those connections around Springfield. I don't know if I'm gonna come back here after college or not, but if I do, I definitely have a bunch of people that I know I can text and say, hey, I'm back. Do you have any opportunities for me and stuff like that just to grow myself?

SPEAKER_03

Well, we'd love to have you back. Every community struggles keeping that 18 to you know 30, early 30s range. Uh so yeah, we'd love to have you back, Emory. Just come on back to Springfield, man. Come on home, come on home. So your business. Let's hear about it.

SPEAKER_04

So we got the Ben Bandits trash can cleaning service. So for$25, we'll come to your house and clean your trash can and put it back into your garage for you. Okay.

SPEAKER_03

So what what brought that idea up?

SPEAKER_04

Another thing of me, uh me, my I have a co-founder on Missouri, couldn't make it, but another thing of us being lazy, the deadline started coming, right? Okay. And uh I want to say we AI'd a bunch of businesses. Hey, we're doing a project, yada, yada. Gave us a bunch of businesses, we couldn't really decide on one. And then he was out taking his trash can out. He's like, this smells horrible. And that clean a trash can was one of the businesses on the AI. Uh-huh. So I was like, all right, you know what? Let's do it. And he came to me and said, Hey, what if we clean trash cans? And I said, That sounds horrible. I don't want to do that. But then slowly but surely it kind of convinced me, and then it worked out for the best.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. So some of the businesses that were pitching last week had already started and are making money. Some were just more in the in the startup phase or in the pitch phase, trying to get everything worked out. Where are you at?

SPEAKER_04

Definitely startup. Definitely startup. Um, we're just starting to grow. You know, we've really only cleaned trash cans of neighbors and friends like that, mostly word of mouth. But we're trying to grow our Instagram right now and get more uh client outreach.

SPEAKER_03

So for for your cleaning of the trash cans, do you have a machine that does it? Do you have a power washer? What do you do?

SPEAKER_04

Power washer, power washer. We did a uh survey and found that most people are okay with us hooking up to their water spigot. So we bring the uh power washer out. We have uh partner with another CEO business actually to get our soap. There was a girl there that did like all natural soaps. Oh, yeah. I bought some from us. Yeah. She was on my judging list. Yeah so we partnered with her uh to get use the soap for cleaning. So we come out there, uh spray it down, apply the soap, scrub it out, you know, get all the grime out of the bottom and put it back in your garage clean.

SPEAKER_03

There you go. Do you use that as a as a marketing pitch too? Not only are we cleaning it, but we're cleaning it with safe safe ingredients.

SPEAKER_04

Absolutely. For a good price, too.

SPEAKER_03

Right, exactly. So$25 to get one can forty for two. All right. So how long does it take you to clean a can? About 20 minutes. All right.

SPEAKER_04

Keeps us moving. Ideally, we come on a trash day, so there's no trash in the uh in the can.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

If we could just follow a trash uh around, that'd be great.

SPEAKER_03

So what do you do if you go and it's a full trash can? You have to just hang out and put it back in?

SPEAKER_04

Well, we might take it with us. We keep some bags on hand with us in case there's anything at the bottom of the can that we have to take with us. Ideally, we just go on a trash day.

SPEAKER_03

Right. It'd be nice. You ever run with what you've done so far? Have you run anything weird yet? Dead animals or something in the bottom of the case?

SPEAKER_04

Not yet, thank goodness, but I'm sure it's bound to happen. I mean, it's some of the stuff at the bottom is really, really gross. It's a bring a mask or something. Uh-nothing bad, thank goodness yet.

SPEAKER_03

Right. So do you plan on continuing this? You're gonna be at Old Miss, so obviously if you're doing it, you're not doing it here. Sure. Because it's more of a hands-on business compared to what Elijah's was, where he could do his remote from from really anywhere, right?

SPEAKER_04

Well, we've talked about passing the we have a couple friends stand here in Lincoln Land, and we've talked about passing on the business to them so they can keep doing it in college. But if we we thought about also doing an old miss and just having that way we have money on hand for going out and going out to football games, stuff like that, possibly scaling up to dumpsters, maybe to really make more money doing dumpsters, I'd imagine, real businesses.

SPEAKER_03

Oh, yeah, yeah. Because you could certainly charge more than 25 bucks for a to a business to go out and clean their garbage.

SPEAKER_04

But right now we're starting small, just residential. Um, maybe partner with HOAs down there at Ole Miss and try to get a whole neighborhood done.

SPEAKER_03

That would be good. Yeah, because some of those big dumpsters behind businesses and restaurants and stuff, they can get kind of funky. So they'd they'd probably be not for having you come out.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, that'd be a tough project. That'd be probably five pressure washers for that one.

SPEAKER_03

Right. Well, are you staying in uh dorms at Ole Miss? Well, hopefully.

SPEAKER_04

So all freshmen have to live on campus. So I apply for housing next week. Hopefully, we get a good dorm, and I'm excited.

SPEAKER_03

Well, the reason I ask is when you find the person you need to pitch to get all the all the dorm business. All you guys are dumpsters and uh and and cans out there, man. It's a good probably a bunch of them down there. I guarantee so start knocking on doors. That's right. Well, you learned how to do some of that stuff, right? Learned how to do the entrepreneurship side this year so you can start pitching the right folks. What was your favorite thing about CEO this year?

SPEAKER_04

I gotta say, meeting all the people. It's really, really cool to see. We were talking about Nicholas earlier. He had us he had us all download LinkedIn. Oh, yeah. So now you know every person comes talk to our class, first thing I do is connect with them on LinkedIn. I told you I work at a line eye country club. Yeah. So you make a connection out there, add them on LinkedIn. Uh-huh. Yeah, it's just been growing that connection. Well, I need connections out there for you. Oh, easily, easily. So, you know, people I can message later in life when I need them down the road.

SPEAKER_03

Right. So speaking of LinkedIn, is that something people you guys' age even really think about? Did you think about LinkedIn before Nicholas came in and talked to you about it?

SPEAKER_04

A little bit, but more as uh as a joke. Yeah. Come up to your friends and say, Hey, connect me on LinkedIn. But then uh now most of my friends now. LinkedIn. Right. And now it's not going to college, not much of a joke anymore. It's actually, hey, you need reason for business.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, you can make some real connections on there. It's funny that you said it because I I got some requests, some connection requests, maybe after Nicholas was there. So I'm sure everybody's downloading LinkedIn and I'm starting to get all these CEO requests. It's a cool thing now. Yeah, absolutely. So do you post differently on LinkedIn than you do, say, on Instagram? Absolutely. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04

I try to hold off, refrain from posting too much on Instagram, especially business stuff related to school and stuff like that. But on LinkedIn, you know, it's gold, anything related to school and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_03

Oh yeah. Don't be afraid to post the business stuff on your Instagram.

SPEAKER_04

I might start to now. Yeah. I reposted our second place.

SPEAKER_03

The more people can see, I post all my stuff to business pages and personal pages. So the more your your face gets out there and your business gets out there, it's going to be better. So grow your personal brand alongside your business brand. So well, I asked Elijah the same thing. Any advice for young entrepreneurs out there?

SPEAKER_04

Don't be scared to do it, you know. Um for us, I mean, we're just at a presentation, but it's kind of scary to say, like, actually do it, you know. It's the idea stage is fine until you actually get there and start investing money and looking at the consequences of what happens if it goes bad, which sometimes you just gotta do it.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. It's a lot of times it's the start that stops most people. Yeah. It's the taking that leap that they don't want to do. It's the getting going, is what a lot of people struggle with. So yeah. Don't be scared. Take that leap. That's what I got. Well, if somebody wants to get their trash can cleaned, which I might be one of those, it can get a little stanky sometimes. So where would they go to hold of you?

SPEAKER_04

Ben Bannett's trash can cleaning on Instagram. Ben Bennett's 217.

SPEAKER_03

All right. You gonna put up a website or anything?

SPEAKER_04

Right now we're just just on Instagram.

SPEAKER_03

The guy DM us. DM. All right. There you go. Well, appreciate you popping by and talking with me. Absolutely. We're gonna let Emory get back to Elevate in Springfield, and we're gonna bring up the third place winner right after the break. And we are back. We've got the third place winner of the new venture challenge from last week through Sangham and CEO. Sophia is joining me now. Sophia, how are you doing?

SPEAKER_01

I'm doing great. How are you?

SPEAKER_03

Oh, fantastic. Thanks for popping by on this beautiful Springfield morning.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, thank you for the opportunity.

SPEAKER_03

No doubt about it. So before we talk a bit about the business, let's talk about you. Sophia, tell us a little bit about you.

SPEAKER_01

Okay. Uh I'm Sophia Sergott. I'm a senior at Pleasant Plains High School, but I decided to graduate early last semester. So I attend Lincoln Land. I'm going to the University of Iowa next year and studying political science and international affairs. And then currently I'm interning with a local lobbyist, Liz Brown Reeves, because I'm really interested in that kind of stuff. So that's been a great opportunity for me.

SPEAKER_03

Awesome. So Lincoln Land, you're just doing gen eds and stuff. Get some of that stuff out of it.

SPEAKER_01

So I'm taking a lot of political science and a lot of psychology classes.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. How'd you come across the internship that you're doing now?

SPEAKER_01

Well, actually, her son is a year younger than me in high school, and we've always been friendly with each other. And I shadowed her last year in like March. And then the college student that was supposed to do it dropped out. And so she needed someone on the fly and was like, just ask me. So there you go.

SPEAKER_03

So on the politics side, are you wanting to get into politics as in run for anything? Or you like more the back end stuff?

SPEAKER_01

I'm interested in all of it for sure. But it's one of those things where it's just day by day. You can't just say, I'm going to be president of the United States. It's not how it works. But I'd be interested in maybe continuing a degree in law after college, or I'm interested in diplomacy or being a lobbyist. I mean, originally I wasn't going to stay in Springfield. Like I was the girl that was like, I'm getting out of here as soon as I graduate. But CEO and Liz, they've convinced me to stay here just because there's so many connections and so much opportunity in politics in Springfield.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. And there's so many great people here. Yeah, yeah. So you guys were able to meet a lot of those folks this year.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

So why did you take CEO in the first place?

SPEAKER_01

Originally I had never heard of it, but my junior year, like right before the application closed, I was talking with someone and I was telling him that I was interested in politics. And he was like, Oh, well, and being a lobbyist or something like that. And he was like, Oh, well, have you heard of CEO? You should definitely take it. And I was like, No, I haven't. And I like panicked. I was like, I need to sign up for CEO. I'm gonna apply for it. So yeah, I just kind of fell into it.

SPEAKER_03

There you go. So do you have a uh favorite business that you visited this year or a favorite speaker that came out to talk to you guys?

SPEAKER_01

Um I really enjoyed them all, but I liked the outgoing girls like Paige Henderson or Rebecca Gabani. I really liked all of them because they had some good input about being a woman in business.

SPEAKER_03

Awesome. Well, let's get into your business. Tell us about it.

SPEAKER_01

My business is edible dough by soap. It is an edible cookie dough business. I started selling probably mid-February, end of February. I sell about eight different flavors. It's all completely edible. I decided to do it because I thought there would be a good market opportunity for it in Springfield because there's nothing like it, and you can't just buy edible cookie dough somewhere. You can get it at the grocery store, but it's like one flavor and has a bunch of preservatives. So that's why I decided to do it. It was kind of just fell into my lap, really.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. So you said the stuff at the store has a bunch of preservatives. Are you a little more uh conscious of your ingredients then I suppose?

SPEAKER_01

Yes. Obviously, it's a dessert, so it's not healthy. Right, right. You're not trying to be the healthy, but yeah. Right. But it's basic ingredients like sugar, vanilla, flour, everything you've heard of. There's no like potassium iodine or something like that. It's just basic ingredients you have in your kitchen.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. Walk us through some of your flavors.

SPEAKER_01

Um, I have chocolate chip. My highest seller is a caramel crunch. So it has caramel bits in it. It's chocolate based and has pretzels. And then I do a sugar cookie with sprinkles, and then I have a bunch of like random, unique flavors like red velvet and cookie monster. I do a sugar-free chocolate chip for people with diabetes. So yeah, I have like tons of things. And I'm interested if someone wants to request something, I totally do a different flavor.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. So walk us through your process since that being, you know, those aren't going to be shelf stable forever. Right. So are you more of a made-to-order type business, or do you have stuff on on hand or you go to shows, or what do you what do you do?

SPEAKER_01

Um, I don't have stuff on hand just because I don't want to risk it going bad. So I have people typically order, I'll collect orders over a week or two weeks, and then within hopefully a week of their order, I'll fill it and deliver it to them.

SPEAKER_03

You deliver it personally.

SPEAKER_01

Uh it's kind of a weird process. Like if I see someone at CEO that knows someone at SHG that goes to SHG, I'll give it to them and they'll take it for me. Or if I see them throughout my day.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. So do you plan on continuing this?

SPEAKER_01

Well, originally I was not planning on continuing the business after CEO. And then a lot of people have reached out to me and asked me to do farmers markets. So I think it's more so gonna be bulk orders instead of the weekly order.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. There you go. The farmers markets would be good. Right. And I can kind of do um heavy into local first. We have a market in the wintertime. Yeah, have a little table there and sell from there.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

That'd be cool.

SPEAKER_01

That's definitely the goal.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. All right. And you could even you could work with a lot of different restaurants or caterers and have that be a part of it. Yeah. So cool. Well, tell us a little bit about your pitch. How did you pitch folks last week?

SPEAKER_01

Um, I pitched on the basis that I was trying to solve the problem that they're all of the edible cookie doughs in Springfield were full of preservatives because I wanted to go for a very strong, well-known problem that I wanted to tackle because I thought that would resonate with people. So that's kind of what I pitched on.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

And the the cleaner ingredients, even though it is a dessert, would resonate to somebody, you know, like me. It's I'm very strict on the ingredients and stuff. So that's a and that sector is growing tremendously right now. And definitely people aren't wanting all that junk in their in their food anymore.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And the edible cookie dough market is supposed to grow and double by 2030 at$6.6 billion. So there's definitely a opportunity there, I'd say.

SPEAKER_03

Why is other cookie dough not edible?

SPEAKER_01

Um, it's because there's eggs or there's baking products in it, such as baking soda or baking powder. And then the like final hitter is whenever they use flour products like flour or cocoa powder, it can contain bacteria in it. So I bake mine to make sure there's no bacteria, kill all the bacteria, and it's completely safe.

SPEAKER_03

So you bake it and first.

SPEAKER_01

I bake the flour. I make the flour and like cocoa powder from the city. Oh, gotcha. Okay. All right.

SPEAKER_03

I misunderstood. All right. That makes that makes sense.

SPEAKER_01

It's a little difficult to understand at first, but yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Okay. So over the summer, are you gonna this hard, you think, before you do more school in the fall?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, well, I have nothing else to do. I mean, I'm a waitress, but that's it. So I probably will.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. Yeah. Where are your waitress at?

SPEAKER_01

Um, I work at the granary in Pleasant Plains. It's like a little barn grill.

SPEAKER_03

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Cool. Well, any advice for young entrepreneurs out there?

SPEAKER_01

Well, if you're gonna make a business, I think it's best to remember that you can't please everyone. A lot of at the beginning, I really, really wanted to please everyone and like make sure everybody was happy. But I realized, you know, if I don't have the flavor, I'm not gonna go out of my way to make it for them just because that's the only thing they want. So just remember you have a specific market that you're headed for and you can't get everyone in the world to buy from you.

SPEAKER_03

There you go. But if somebody's out there and wants to buy some of that cookie dough from you, where do they go?

SPEAKER_01

Well, you can hit me up on Instagram. You can look up at at edible dough by sof, and then you can go ahead and DM me. Or if you want to use Facebook, you can look up Sophia-Serga on Facebook and DM me on there.

SPEAKER_03

There you go. Well, appreciate it, Sophia. Well, have fun learning about your business and all three of you guys' business.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, thank you very much.

SPEAKER_03

Congratulations to all three of you. I know you guys got uh bright futures ahead, and I'm looking forward to seeing what you guys accomplish. It's gonna be great.

SPEAKER_01

Well, thank you so much.

SPEAKER_03

Absolutely. Well, we're gonna let all three of these guys get back to Elevate in Springfield, but for the rest of y'all, we'll be right back. Looking for expert tree care with hometown integrity, look no further than Sangamon Tree Service. They're your trusted local pros, delivering quality workmanship, exceptional customer service, and fair, honest pricing every time. Whether it's trimming, removal, or storm cleanup, their team brings professionalism and care to every job, big or small. Call the name your neighbor's trust, Sangman Tree Service, or visit them today at SangmanTreeService.com. Sangamon Tree Service, rooted in quality, built on trust. Looking for personalized insurance with hometown care, David Hilst, American Family Insurance Agent is here to help you protect what matters most: your family, your home, and your dreams. Whether it's auto, home, life, business, David and his team are proud to serve the Springfield community with trusted advice and reliable coverage. Local service, real relationships, peace of mind. Call today or stop by their office. They can build your dream protection plan together. Call 217-726-6343. Well, thank you for joining us today, everybody. Appreciate you making us a part of your day. Hey, don't forget while you're out on social, check ours out. You can check my personal one out at RobertFarrell at everywhere. Check out those Elevate Springfield pages, those big dog business coaching pages as well. Check us out over on YouTube. Give us a subscribe, give us a like or a follow on any of those channels. We would certainly appreciate it. So, hey, take what you learned today. You bring the discipline and follow through and together. That's right, y'all. We're gonna elevate Springfield. Be great.

SPEAKER_00

When I first walked into Shudokong Karate Club, I was just looking for a way to get stronger. But what I found was so much more. Here we train in traditional karate, the real stuff. Passed down through generations. Every punch, every kata has purpose. I've learned self discipline, confidence, and how to protect myself. Not just in class, but in real life. It's not about being aggressive, it's about being prepared. This is more than a club, it's a way of life. Join us at Shudo Khan. Traditional, powerful, real. TI!