Southeast Alaska business competition announces finalists – KSTK

A dozen small companies in Southeast Alaska are finalists on this yr’s Path to Prosperity competitors. They have been chosen from 23 companies who utilized this yr. All the finalists will get coaching in enterprise administration and two will stroll away with a $25,000 prize.

CoastAlaska’s Angela Denning stories:

Aaron Angerman grew up in Wrangell and has watched the tourism trade develop there. On busy summer time days, the city of two,000 sees a whole bunch of holiday makers disembark small and mid-size cruise ships. So, Angerman and his spouse, Mikki, thought up a enterprise thought: electrical scooters, just like the stand-up ones that children kick round however battery powered.

“Completely electrical,” Aaron Angerman stated. ” No emissions or anything like that. Good quiet transportation.”

You might need seen them in larger cities rented out by means of cellphone apps from firms like Lime or Chook. Nevertheless, it could be a brand new enterprise for Wrangell and Angerman says they’d be low-cost and simple transportation for vacationers.

“You’ll be able to simply choose considered one of these up and go, you don’t have to fret about putting it, you merely simply park it, take an image, and push ‘finish journey’,” stated Angerman. “That’s all you need to do. You don’t have to show it again in anyplace. You may get from level A to level B and never fear about returning to level A in case you don’t need.”

The scooters will be recharged as wanted, which the couple may handle on-line. They plan to start out with 12 to 16 and develop from there.

Angerman and his spouse are finalists within the annual enterprise competitors run by Spruce Root, a regional non-profit that promotes financial development. Spruce Root was began in 2012 by Haa Aani, a subsidiary of Sealaska Company.

For a second yr in a row, the Path to Prosperity competitors pertains to tourism, particularly companies that proceed to learn native residents.

Isabella Haywood is the competitors’s administrator.

“We wished to be sure that native companies are actually geared up to construct companies in a method that not solely serves the guests that come to the area but in addition channel financial advantages from these guests deep into their communities,” she stated.

In October, the 12 finalists will undergo a workshop, studying learn how to polish their enterprise plans.

Rebecca Kamaika is wanting ahead to it. She’s a baker in Haines and want to open a small restaurant specializing in tapas, wine and dessert. Tapas are appetizers in Spanish delicacies and a part of Kamaika’s Cuban heritage.

“Whereas folks do eat on the [cruise] ship, I’m considering a tapas factor is . . . you’re probably not committing to a complete meal. Possibly they’re strolling round, you realize, ‘Possibly I do need a glass of wine or beer’, get a small plate or a slice of cake. You recognize, type of one thing a bit “bougie”, I suppose, can be the phrase, and a bit atypical for the world.”

She’s undecided if she’d have a dine in or walk-up scenario. Both method, she’s wanting ahead to extra kitchen area. At present, she bakes out of an residence.

For Kameika baking is an artwork type. She tapes drawings of her concepts to the wall.

“I’ll sketch out my cake designs right here and put them up,” stated Kamaika, “have a look at them, up till the marriage, see if I wish to make some changes.”

She says she’s glad she’s doing the Path to Prosperity competitors as a result of she needs to contemplate all of her choices, together with presumably contracting with cruise firms.

Jim Silverthorn is one other finalist. He needs to start out a catch and launch fly fishing competitors for steelhead trout on Prince of Wales Island that will attract vacationers yearly.

“Between the entire Native artwork and native crafts folks and stuff like that, we’re placing all this collectively as one realm,” stated Silverthorn. “It could be a reasonably large factor.”

Silverthorn runs a fishing constitution enterprise out of Thorne Bay and says fishermen deliver cash to the city each summer time. He says a steelhead occasion would begin the vacationer season earlier–in April– when the sought-after trout are working. And that will deliver extra income to the distant cities on the economically depressed island. He says the town receives gross sales tax from their purchases.

“These guys are shopping for fuel or shopping for groceries or shopping for booze or shopping for, you realize, they’re renting automobiles or staying in an residence staying in homes,” he stated.

Guides can be required to go together with the fishermen so Silverthorn says the competitors might create jobs for residents throughout the island.

The 2 winners of Path to Prosperity can be introduced in February. The annual competitors was began in 2013 and has awarded a complete of $610,000 to 19 winners.