CBJ | Benedict startups, year 2

February 4, 2008

College helping startups succeed

By JASON RYAN
Special to The State

The office space was nice and the community pleasant, but insurance agent Bryant Dennis wasn't generating enough leads in northeast Columbia.

So 14 months ago he packed up the office of Prestige Insurance and moved downtown, setting up shop alongside six other small businesses in the Business Development Center at Benedict College.

Here, Benedict promised to help Prestige Insurance and other minority-owned businesses get on their feet through the help of up to three years of subsidized rent, shared office equipment, and business counseling.

Since the move, Dennis said, his business has taken off, as he has become insurer to several area churches, Benedict professors and staff and neighborhood residents.

Business has been so good he has hired an agent to work alongside him and is considering hiring another. Radio spots and billboard ads are on the horizon.

"The area has done so well for us," said Dennis, whose Columbia office is outpacing Prestige's branches in Chester and Charlotte. "Better than ever expected."

A little more than a year after opening, Benedict's business incubator has seen one business, Imara Woman magazine, graduate to its own office space, a tutoring service move closer to clients in Charleston and five others stay in place, according to director David Palmer.

A security company and a mortgage company are the newest tenants, and seven new office spaces might be available within a year, said Palmer, so long as Benedict allocates the necessary $350,000.

Benedict's incubator program is designed to help revitalize the neighborhood surrounding Benedict's campus by allowing minority-owned businesses to on their feet while providing jobs to poor residents and encouraging redevelopment, Palmer explained.

There are more than 5,000 incubators worldwide, according to the National Business Incubation Association, and 1,100 within the United States.

Many are associated with universities, helping commercialize technology and research produced by the university, said Tracy Kitts, vice president and chief operating officer for the Athens, Ohio-based incubation association.

Other incubators are in the mold of Benedict's, designed to create and retain businesses and inspire entrepreneurial attitudes.

People feel they can create jobs for themselves, Kitts said, instead of waiting for work. And motivation and success can become contagious when ambitious entrepreneurs are placed under one roof.

"Some of the most interesting conversations and deals happen in the hallway," he said, noting that about 84 percent of successfully incubated businesses stay in the community.

At the corner of Read Street and Two Notch Road, the perks of cheap rent and new office space come with a catch, though, as Palmer said business owners are required to attend monthly counseling sessions to discuss topics that include accounting, taxes and marketing. Business owners can also arrange for one-on-one counseling sessions.

Lately, the incubator has been encouraging each business to create a Web site, Palmer said, and the incubator is making it's own, too.

But for all the promised counseling and cushy rent, the small businesses in Benedict's incubator still have the struggles common to other outfits.

As well as Prestige Insurance has been doing, Dennis is trying to figure out how to land additional clients, favoring giving the radio spots a shot instead of making cold calls.

At the Columbia franchise for Fish Window Cleaning, turnover has been a perennial problem, said owner James McGraw, and employees in the past have often come to work saddled with personal problems.

McGraw said he would like Benedict's incubator to offer more training and teaching to employees, referencing the helpful human resources department he observed when he worked as a test driver at a Mack Truck factory in Fairfield County until it closed in 2002.

As a small business of five employees, he said he is limited to the help he can offer, unable to help employees obtain GEDs, transportation or health services.

"They're trying to do better, but we can't offer them anything more than a paycheck," McGraw said.

McGraw also said the incubator could improve by offering computer help and arranging for legal assistance.

He is battling viruses on his computers and just bought two new units, though he is unsure how to set them up and whether he bought appropriate equipment.

Accounting has been problematic, leading to high bills from his CPA.

And his cash flow has been chaotic, as some customers don't pay, forcing him to resort to legal action, which is expensive.

Still, for all the hiccups, Fish Window Cleaning in Columbia has grown its sales for the last five years, creating a client list of more than 500 people and businesses. McGraw said he even wrote 50 "Dear John" letters this year to clients, canceling service to unprofitable customers.

"Accounts don't mean anything if they don't pay you what you're worth," he said.

As the New Year begins, McGraw is considering increasing his vehicle fleet beyond two trucks.

Palmer said he's organizing workshops for January, February and March to help the incubator's businesses prepare their taxes.

And Dennis, an effusive and affable salesman, is counting on insuring more clients and relying on the extensive referrals and networks he has built from being downtown, within a college, and down the hall from other small businesses.

"We share clients, we share contacts," he said of his neighbors.

When his three years in the incubator are up at the end of 2009, Dennis said he wouldn't be straying far, already eyeing land a few blocks away slated for new offices.

He credits Benedict College for revitalizing the neighborhood and for giving his business credibility through its association with the college and the business development center.

"It's been wonderful here," Dennis said.

Source: The State Newspaper

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