C-BIZ: Winter 2018

It’s all of our business. WINTER 2018

Back from the brink

Black Bear Composting, renewed and reaffirmed

GOOD FOR

BUSINESS From 2007 to 2017, private enterprises grew twice as fast locally as elsewhere in Virginia. What makes Charlottesville so conducive to starting a business? Local entrepreneurs have some theories.

Two decades in, an undies company rethinks its path

Antwon Brinson's culinary program trains future pros A money planner for ballers' financial future Lifeview Marketing owner Ty Cooper says smaller communities like Charlottesville bring a loyalty that larger markets don't.

A local food force aims for national domination

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6 C-BIZ

Why wait, just call.

Why wait,

17

WINTER 2018

Why hiring a coach may be smart

18

A kitchen staff training program from a true pro.

21

14

Convoy’s cool new digs.

15

No Bull Burger is gaining ground.

16

The Ivy Group’s storytelling approach.

IN THIS ISSUE... THE PITCH

11

Maurice Covington’s off-the-field advice.

13

Finances for freelancers: How to?

What even is design thinking?

23

Max Boxxer’s reinvention.

46

Backstory: West Main Street’s Queen Charlotte Hotel.

34

Start it up

Our region’s business community has seen a rise of all things entrepreneurial over the past 15 years. This issue looks at what makes the Charlottesville area the best place to start a business (and why those who have already made that decision continue to thrive). Plus: Zeroing in on resources for tech startups. + Charlottesville’s growth numbers.

Cover photo by Sanjay Suchak

308 E. Main St. Charlottesville, VA 22902 (434) 817-2749 ■ c-ville.com c-ville.com/cbiz

26 Pay dirt

How Black Bear Composting came back from the brink.

C-BIZ, a supplement to C-VILLE Weekly, is distributed in Charlottesville, Albemarle County and the Shenandoah Valley. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher. Editor Laura Longhine. C-BIZ Editor Caite Hamilton. Copy Editor Susan Sorensen. Creative Director Bill LeSueur.Editorial Designer Max March. Graphic Designers Tracy Federico, Lorena Perez. Account Executives Erica Gentile, Theressa Leak, Alex Patterson, Cindy Simmons, Beth Wood. Production Coordinator Faith Gibson. Publisher Aimee Atteberry. Chief Financial Officer Debbie Miller. Marketing Manager Anna Harrison. A/R Specialist Nanci Winter. Circulation Manager Billy Dempsey. ©2018 C-VILLE Weekly.

C-BIZ 7

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A playbook for profits Maurice Covington helps pro athletes spend and save for success after sports. By Nathan Alderman

T

wo days into training camp with the Chicago Bears, Maurice Covington’s hamstring tore—and took his future plans with it. “Being focused about football and wanting to make it to the NFL and then having that taken from me,” says the former UVA wide receiver, “that transition was terrible.” A decade later, Covington has turned that painful setback into a flourishing career. At Charlottesvillebased Rede Wealth, he’s helping pro athletes make smart money decisions to prepare for a life after sports.

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C ONTI NUED F R OM PAGE 13

The Durham, North Carolina, native spent 2005 to 2008 with the Virginia Cavaliers. After his injury, he pursued a degree in sports management at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, where he worked as a graduate assistant and academic advisor for student athletes. “I would constantly see the same thing,” Covington recalls. “These athletes—some of them were my friends, some of them were kids I mentored, some of my teammates—I would constantly see them go off and play three, four, five, six, seven years in the NFL or NBA, and then always revert back to their college for help.” A 2009 Sports Illustrated study found that 78 percent of ex-NFL and NBA players were broke or struggling two years after retiring. “The biggest mistake they make,” Covington says, “is thinking that the money they’re earning at that level is going to come in forever.” Athletes often spend beyond their means, fail to shop around for the best deals on big-ticket purchases, or offer their families financial help in ways they just can’t sustain long-term, he says. And they often fail to identify passions beyond sports, or seize the opportunities to network and work toward those interests. After completing his degree at LSU, in 2012 Covington moved to UVA’s athletic program. He helped build a series of workshops that teach students to identify career goals and cultivate business skills— resume-building, elevator pitches, even dressing for success. But Covington wanted to do even more to help, and a 2016 job offer from Rede CEO and co-founder Stephen McNaughton gave him that opportunity. At Rede, Covington manages money for around a dozen pro athletes—confidentiality forbids him from naming them—plus other local and national entrepreneurs. Covington creates budgets for clients to follow, advises them on big-ticket purchases, helps them cultivate their credit, and creates custom portfolios to sock away a healthy share of their earnings. “They’re not putting too much of their assets in them, but enough to create them a nice pot of money,” he says. “Always, the goal is long-term wealth.” Looking forward, Covington hopes he can help even more athletes avoid the pain he once felt. “There’s so many athletes out there mismanaging money or doing the wrong things, and some of them even being advised by the wrong people,” he says. “I really just want to be able to touch more people, and help them learn proper money management skills and save wisely for the future.”

The Pitch > Finance

Independent funding Navigating finances as a freelance contractor By David Posner

T

here are more 1099 contractors in the workforce than ever before and their numbers continue to rise. The term “1099” comes from a series of IRS documents that are designed to report income received outside of salaried employment. This can include investment returns, tax refunds, and income made as an independent contractor or freelancer. The first thing to understand is that a 1099 contractor will most likely receive a smaller percentage of her paycheck as “take home” than a W2 employee. One major reason for the difference is that 1099 contractors often have to pay more for medical coverage, while W2 employees are oftentimes covered on their corporate health plan.

Another sizable hit that a 1099 contractor takes on her income comes from the Federal Insurance Contributions Act, or FICA. FICA consists of a payment for Social Security at 12.4 percent and a payment for Medicare at 2.9 percent. A W2 employee splits the cost of FICA with their employer, each paying 6.2 percent for Social Security and 1.45 percent for Medicare. An independent contractor, on the other hand, has to pay both sides of FICA as there is no employer to share the cost. This can really add up. In rough numbers, a person making $75,000 per year would have to pay almost $11,500 as an independent contractor in FICA alone, compared to just under $5,750 as a W2 salaried employee. Independent contractors can also have a more difficult time saving for retirement. Similar to health insurance, there are advantages to being in a big “pool” when it comes to retirement. The primary disadvantage a 1099 contractor faces is the type of investment vehicles available. Many salaried employees have access to a 401(k) (or a similar retirement savings vehicle) through their company. Many of these plans encourage automatic contributions to be made directly from an individual’s paycheck, and some companies even incentivize those contributions through matching initiatives. Once again, the 1099 contractor has to go at it alone. The good news here is that independent contractors have access to several different types of retirement plans, and there is usually one that is a good fit for just about anyone. That said, the burden of finding a plan, and taking advantage of it once it is set up, lies with the individual. David Posner is local investment executive specializing in utilizing socially responsible options for long-term financial goals.

C-BIZ 13

The Pitch > Spaces

Modern reality After a lengthy search, design firm Convoy finds a mixed-use home By Erika Howsare

14 C-BIZ

PHOTOS: STEPHEN BARLING

I

t’s a sign of a Charlottesville that’s growing and changing. On a site on East High Street, where once stood two small single-family houses, architect and developer Richard Price is creating a cluster of modern buildings to provide “medium-density” working and living space. At the moment, some of the project is yet to be built— but one occupant, the design firm Convoy, is already working out of its new office in the most visible building of the Eleven:30 project. “We had been looking for an office building to buy for almost five years,” says Convoy’s Tim McDaniels, “but we never could find something in our price point.” Previously, the company worked in the Terraces building downtown. “We wanted a place that was modern that we could upfit,” says CEO Matt Shadel. When they spotted the Eleven:30 project—then still in the planning stages—they immediately liked the location on the East High Street corridor, and they were attracted to Price’s modern design, customizable to their needs. What sealed their interest was the fact that Price could easily increase the square footage of their office—by adding a basement level—and that they would also own a second-floor rental apartment to generate extra income. “Convoy’s done a great job picking up on overall design cues,” says Price, praising his clients’ choices for interior finishes. “My design philosophy is low-key.” He had envisioned a clean, lightfilled space, and Convoy especially liked his choice of natural-wood doors. “We built on that,” says Creative Director Matt Thomas, pointing out the light-hued engineered maple floor on the office’s main level. The team needed closed-door offices for Shadel and McDaniels, who occupy the basement level along with a conference room. Upstairs, Thomas and two other designers share an open work area, which can potentially accommodate more workers in the future, along with a small kitchenette, an entryway and a production space. The look is simple and neutral, with Convoy’s design work providing color wherever it’s hung on the walls. Convoy’s building faces the street and creates a visible presence for the company. Big north-facing windows provide perfect indirect lighting. Considering that the space was built to Convoy’s specifications, says Shadel, “We feel like we stumbled on an amazing opportunity.”

Convoy’s office space in the Eleven:30 project on East High Street ends the design firm’s five-year search for a home. “We wanted a place that was modern that we could upfit,” says CEO Matt Shadel.

MARTYN KYLE

The Pitch > Expanding

Crissanne and Elizabeth Raymond started selling NoBull Burgers at Charlottesville's City Market, but now the company's reach expands as far west as Colorado, with California in the owners' sights.

A noble calling Veggie burgers that taste good By Lisa Martin

C

rissanne Raymond developed an original veggie burger recipe more than 30 years ago in her hometown of St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands. Riffing off of her mother’s lentil soup recipe, she built a burger from a lentil and barley base, flavored it with roasted vegetables and tamari, and used it to feed her growing family. “Fast forward a few decades and five kids later, and she was living in Charlottesville and running her own catering business,” says Raymond’s daughter, Elizabeth. The family had long mused about a veggie burger enterprise, and after selling her stake in local catering company Glorious Foods, Raymond teamed up with daughters Elizabeth and Heather to launch NoBull Burger in 2011. The venture, like the burgers, began organically. “Mom had experience installing a kitchen and getting it certified, so we set one up on East Market Street, and our first sales were at the farmer’s market,” recalls Elizabeth. “We had a grill, gave out samples, and sold sandwiches and two-packs. Those first sales gave us a spurt of affirmation that this was something we could really do.” Their younger brother came up with the name NoBull as a triple entendre—alluding to no meat, no nonsense, and the “noble” aspect of an organic, gourmet product. Raymond, a UVA graduate, had waited tables downtown all through school and had restaurant contacts willing to put the burgers on the menu, where they garnered good reviews. “At the farmer’s market, we met the owners of Bo-

do’s as well as a coordinator of the Whole Foods local program, plus lots of local chefs, which were great connections,” she says. Bodo’s features a NoBull sandwich on its menu (tip: Topping it with a fried egg is a fan favorite). From there, things picked up speed. The sisters went door-to-door with samples, placing NoBull in Rebecca’s Natural Food, Integral Yoga, Market Street Market, and in restaurants like The Nook and now-defunct Positively Fourth Street. “We took lots of sales trips to Richmond and D.C.,” says Raymond, “and by 2015 we had our burgers in 22 Whole Foods including Virginia Beach, northern Virginia, and Maryland.” Now their reach extends as far west as Colorado with an eye toward California markets. The Raymonds attribute NoBull’s steady success to the product’s unique taste and purity. “Other veggie burgers are labeled vegan or vegetarian, but the ingredients are full of oils, fillers, additives, and unpronounceable things, and they taste like cardboard,” Raymond says. “With NoBull, you could go to the grocery store and buy our ingredients. Your grandma would know what they are.” Having expanded from the original burger to three other flavors—mushroom and roasted garlic, spicy Italian, and tomato and spinach—NoBull is launching a fourth, Madras Curry, in January, along with updated branding and packaging. Raymond is proud of how far they’ve come. “We started 100 percent by ourselves, with no investors, and it has at times been a struggle,” she says. “But we’re resilient and resourceful women, and we really believe in what we’re doing.”

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The Pitch > Repositioning

Telling the story of a business With the help of The Ivy Group, Crown Orchard creates a compelling brand narrative By Sierra Bellows

16 C-BIZ

COURTESY CROWN ORCHARD

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ears ago, Cynthia Chiles’ mom made hand-lettered fliers to let people know when to come pick apples from the family’s orchards. She took out a classified ad when fruit was ripe. When Chiles took up a leadership role at Crown Orchard 15 years ago, she still did the marketing herself. “I have a degree in marketing. And I love doing it,” she says. “But eventually, I didn’t have time for it.” Five years ago, Chiles approached The Ivy Group to work with her and her family business. “When we first met Cynthia, she had a vision of where she wanted the marketing to go and how the business could grow,” says Pam Fitzgerald, managing director of The Ivy Group. “Together, we envisioned a real partnership where we were all committed to the process.” The first step was for The Ivy Group to learn about Crown Orchard. “We needed to understand what the business was like day-to-day to know its marketing needs. Only then could we create a strategy,” says Fitzgerald. The marketing strategy would be based on a brand narrative, which Fitzgerald says is a promise to the customer of a certain kind of experience. “For a brand narrative to be successful, it must be authentic,” she says. “The stories we tell about a business and the lived experience of the customer have got to match. It’s a living, evolving story. When someone goes to one of the orchards, they create a memory of the experience, which becomes part of the brand narrative.” The Crown Orchard brand narrative arose from “looking around the orchards and seeing what memories are being made today, as well as the story of the Chiles family,” says Fitzgerald. “We didn’t have to romanticize the story because it already had everything it needed. Five generations. The best memories of your

The partnership between Ivy Group and Crown Orchard has proven beneficial for the family-run business. The marketing firm focused on brand narrative, drawing on imagery that evoked family in everything from print materials to social media.

childhood or of the childhood you wished you had.” Fitzgerald, along with Franziska “Siska” Matiuk, Ivy Group brand and web manager, and Julia Prince, digital and content manager, oversaw a brand refresh that created a new look and feel for the brand. Working with Chiles, they decided what images best represented the Crown Orchard experience. “We wanted images that evoked those peak moments that you remember forever,” says Matiuk. “The first bite of a fresh cider donut. Sitting on a picnic blanket watching the sun set over the mountains. Carrying a toddler on piggyback through the peach trees.” The Ivy Group team created a

visual design program that would be consistent across media. They overhauled the website to make it interactive, responsive, and user-friendly. Family is at the core of the orchard experience, so The Ivy Group team has kept the Chiles family front and center. Cynthia is the voice of the orchards on radio, Henry Chiles—as “Farmer Henry”—stars in video content, and Lizzy Chiles, one of the youngest members of the family and a millennial, is The Ivy Group’s marketing partner. As part of developing their strategy, the Ivy Group team conducted customer research. “We needed to figure out who customers were and what they liked,” says Matiuk. “We seg-

mented the customer base and did a personas exercise where we created abstract ‘customers’ to represent the different kinds of people who come to the orchards.” Parents bring their children, of course, but young professionals come, too. Students visit on dates. And empty nesters come to enjoy the view with a glass of wine. In other words, people experience the orchards in many different ways. Personas have invented back-stories, day-to-day lives, preferences, and opinions that allow the creative team to imagine what experiences would appeal to them. “In the office, we’d talk about what kind of concert ‘Barbara,’ the empty nester, would enjoy. Or we’d ask what ‘Tyler,’ the young professional, cares about,” says Prince. The Ivy Group gathered data for two years. The research confirmed many of Cynthia Chiles’ ideas about who her customers were. “It was fascinating to see the personas come to life and to have analytics to confirm that we are moving in the right direction,” says Chiles. Chiles says that working successfully with an agency requires building a relationship of trust. Fitzgerald agrees. “The agency-client relationship often starts small,” says Fitzgerald. “It’s like a courtship in the beginning, testing things out, learning about each other. Later, it’s more like a marriage; there is give and take. We can pick up the slack when needed. The relationship grows with you.” For instance, Chiles isn’t a “big social media person,” she says. Instead, the team at Ivy Group keeps up with the online platforms so that Chiles can keep up with the changes at the orchards. But the relationship is close; Chiles talks or emails with the Ivy team almost every day. “Ultimately, what we are doing is framing the saga of Cynthia and her family,” says Fitzgerald, “a great story that was always there.”

The Pitch > Consulting

Put me in, coach A downtown shop owner tests the business-coach waters By Erika Howsare

TRISTAN WILLIAMS

W

hen Rachel Brozenske, VP with Allison Partners, sat down on a Wednesday morning in October with Linnea White, the two of them were feeling out the possibility of a coach-client relationship. Brozenske has been a business coach for more than a dozen years; White bought the boutique Darling, just off the Downtown Mall, with a friend in 2015, and has been sole owner for two years. “Now that I’ve been able to have pretty steady employees, I feel better about pausing to really sit with the business and think about things,” she told C-BIZ. Darling is a curated consignment boutique, and as owner, White constantly juggles the day-to-day minutiae of running a shop with longer-term questions about where the business is headed. Often, she says, “I just kind of go, go, go. I’m ready to be more intentional about things.” Their meeting was a little compressed in comparison with Brozenske’s usual first sessions with new clients, but she and White did get a couple of important things done. First of all, Brozenske explained to White what exactly a professional coach (her preferred term) is—and isn’t. “I’m not going to crawl around inside your head,” she told her. “You’re smart and creative and whole and you don’t need me to come in and fix you, but I can observe what you’re doing and reflect that back with thoughtful candor. I’m going to tell the truth but not punch you with it.” “I get this attitude of ‘I can do it on my own, I can figure it out myself,’” said White. “I need more of that refined dialogue, to bounce ideas.” After talking through the differences between coaches and consultants, Brozenske led White through a freewriting exercise meant to uncover what’s most on her mind these days—what Brozenske calls “presenting areas of interest.” This consisted of 10 questions, like “What kinds of things are you struggling with at work or away from work?” What came up? White later told C-BIZ, “Styling people, creating beautiful things, community, these are things I like about my work. Things that frustrate me are holding

Having owned downtown consignment boutique Darling for two years, Linnea White says she's ready to be more intentional about where the business is headed.

myself accountable to project-based things, that are important to the business but are not right in front of me.” The boutique’s website, for one, is a project that feels to her like a sticking point. As a visual person, she tends to put that project off and focus on the obvious, immediate tasks that she can see around her in the shop. Brozenske’s response, says White: “She asked ‘How can you make those things on the business management side as important to you? Maybe it needs to be more visually represented in some way.’” An app or other tools might provide her with a reminder about tackling the website—a visual cue to compete with, say, mannequins that need dressing. White says this, for her, was an aha moment. Brozenske explained to C-BIZ that unlike some coaches, she’s not a purist about avoiding direct advice. “With a lot of my clients I straddle the space between coaching and consulting,” she says. “The whole premise of coaching is the individual is complete and resourceful and can discover for him or herself what’s going on. Practically speaking, I also believe when it comes to some things where there is quite simply an answer, it doesn’t serve them best to make them go hunting for that themselves.”

If White were to continue with coaching, says Brozenske, their next step would be to set parameters about what questions the coaching sessions would address, and how many sessions there should be. “It’s really rare that something worthy of coaching can be meaningfully addressed in less than six or eight hours,” says Brozenske. “Often 16 to 20 is more than reasonable.” Like many small business owners, White is always juggling a tight schedule, so investing time and money isn’t something she’d do lightly. She’s still considering whether to jump in with both feet. “I want someone who can speak to the brick and mortar world specifically too,” she says. “We were talking about the difference between a business coach or consultant or mentor, and I said what I’m really looking for is a mentor, someone who worked in retail.” She followed up the meeting with a quick poll on Instagram: Have you worked with a business coach, and was it helpful? “It leaned in a little bit of the direction of ‘No, it wasn’t helpful,’ which surprised me,” she says. “If nothing Rachel said had sat with me, I would have been like, ‘I’m not going to do it.’ But I really did enjoy it; I did learn a lot from it.”

C-BIZ 17

The Pitch > Training

A new recipe for success Chef Antwon Brinson’s Culinary Boot Camp helps local residents build life-changing kitchen careers By Nathan Alderman

18 C-BIZ

JOHN ROBINSON

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teacher changed the course of chef Antwon Brinson’s life. Now, as he trains Charlottesville residents for kitchen careers, he’s trying to do the same for his own students. Brinson says he never thought he’d become a chef. He enjoyed cooking growing up, but didn’t consider it a career until high school. “I had a teacher that believed in me,” Brinson says. “He’d seen something in me that I didn’t see in myself.” With his encouragement, Brinson joined the school’s cooking team, made it to state competition on his first try, and eventually started cooking for a living. By early 2017, Brinson’s culinary career had led him from West Virginia’s exclusive Greenbrier resort to high-end restaurants in Hawaii and California, but he wanted more for himself and his family. “I started to look for something in a location that would allow me to plant my feet, and a position that had the potential for growth,” he says. He spent the next year running the kitchen at Charlottesville’s Common House social club, where an initial hiring snag ended up inspiring his next step. “I couldn’t find staff to save my life,” he says. In this saturated restaurant market, a shortage of qualified employees left “everybody robbing Peter to pay Paul just to get one person to staff a restaurant who didn’t leave.” Brinson decided to create a program that would help people make a decent living in the kitchen. “I’ve spent my entire career building teams, training people, and I’m passionate about it,” he says. He found partners in the city’s economic development office; local restaurants willing to take on the program’s graduates; and CATEC, which provided classrooms and kitchens. Brinson’s class, free of charge to successful applicants, launched last May with six students. “It’s called Culinary Boot Camp for a reason,” he says. “It’s five weeks, five days per week, five hours per day.” He doesn’t accept casual or half-hearted students. “You’ve gotta be passionate. You don’t have to have any experience, you’ve just gotta want it.” An initial classroom discussion about each week’s theme—life skills such as integrity, focus, and communication—gets fleshed out with kitchen drills in what Brinson calls “a controlled envi-

Antwon Brinson never thought he'd be a chef, but “I had a teacher that believed in me,” he says. “He’d seen something in me that I didn’t see in myself.” Now, he wants to do the same for others through his culinary training program.

ronment of failures.” Brinson challenges his students to make mistakes, learn from them, and then help each other avoid them. “By the fifth week, to be honest with you, they’re teaching each other.” After a sixth week of real-world tryouts in Charlottesville restaurants, Brinson’s first class passed with flying colors. “We finished the program with 100 percent retention, 100 percent of all students passed the tests, and 100 percent job placement,” he says. His second cohort of 10 students launched October 15 at the Charlottesville Cooking School

on Barracks Road, with four more students on a waiting list for a third class. Down the road, Brinson says, he’d like to launch his own restaurant to develop students and help them impress future employers. He proudly keeps in touch with previous pupils as they pursue their new goals—passing on the same support that helped him get his start. “Having someone that had the foresight to say, ‘Hey, this kid has potential,’ and just taking the time to invest in you,” he says, “that’s what made all the difference for me.”

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COOKING UP A MORE SATISFYING FUTURE

Chef Antwon Brinson’s Culinary Boot Camp is helping locals with culinary talents sharpen their skills and their goals. One graduate of his first class credits Brinson with helping her realize her ambitions, while another followed Brinson’s advice out of the kitchen—and into a slightly different and unexpected career. Shamia Hopkins has worked in the culinary and hospitality industries since her early teens. She signed up in part to obtain ServSafe food safety certification and further her career, but says she ended up learning a lot more than that. “You’re never too old to ask questions,” she says. “No question is a dumb question, [and] it’s okay to not know everything.” Hopkins says this insight changed her whole outlook on cooking: “I saw myself having the ability to create more than I thought I could. I felt like I regained my imagination and passion.” The confidence she gained in the program has helped Hopkins expand her new catering business, including a successful “soulful farm to table” food booth at a recent Tom Tom Festival event. “Chef Brinson is one of my biggest hype men,” she says. “He encourages me to just go for the gold.” Long term, Hopkins says she wants to open “an awesome farm to table bed and breakfast.” When Daniel Chen applied for Brinson’s Culinary Boot Camp, he’d just left a UVA graduate program in sociology. And while he says he’s loved cooking at home for years, his professional food-service experience began and ended with a former gig working front-of-house at a Chinese restaurant. Chen most remembers the classes’ emphasis on “the crucial balance between proactive preparation and on-the-spot flexibility,” which he said “paradoxically...helped me realize that I didn’t actually want to be a chef after all, but instead that baking was more my forte.” In the final phase of boot camp, Chen sought out a trial run at MarieBette bakery, because “the more controlled atmosphere of production baking suited my personality better than more variable à la carte kitchen environments.” That tryout landed him a full-time job on MarieBette’s 4 a.m. shift. Chen now spends his early mornings baking dough from the night before, readying tarts and treats for the following day, and pursuing a new artistic interest in bread stenciling. “I’m enjoying my time at MarieBette and hope to continue learning as I work,” he says. “Whatever the future holds, I’m sure it will be some mix of bread and books.”—NA

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The Pitch > Business tools

A new perspective Design thinking helps root out the ‘why’ By Sierra Bellows

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formal process for expanding possible solutions, the concept of design thinking has real economic advantages. Randy Salzman, a Charlottesville writer and former communications professor at the University of Virginia, is co-author of Design Thinking for the Greater Good: Innovation in the Social Sector, and has taught human-centered design to college students and business groups, as well as mentored groups undergoing their own design-thinking projects for many years. We asked him to help explain the impact of design thinking. C-BIZ: Let’s start with the basics. What is design thinking? Randy Salzman: Design thinking has been around forever, but it hasn’t been put together systematically until recently. Albert Einstein said that people had a rational mind and an intuitive mind, and that Western society gives preference to the rational mind. Einstein thought that was backwards because the intuitive mind was a sacred gift. Design thinking is a process that balances the two. It is asks us to consider the possibilities before the constraints. Over the past 500 years, Western culture has become more and more specialized. But a lot of the problems that we face today don’t respond well to specialization. The problems are larger. They require cross-disciplinary solutions. The design thinking process is iterative, which is how you solved problems as a child. When you built a tree house, you tried something, it didn’t work quite right, so you tried something else until you had a tree house. You created a solution, but then you created a better one, and an even better one after that. In a world with so many big, complex problems, design thinking allows us to connect to our intuitive minds and look at the world as a process. What’s a current example of design thinking in practice? This year, Forrester, a consulting and market research firm, came out with an economic impact study on how design thinking has affected IBM financially. [It found] IBM teams who use design thinking create projects twice as fast. Their products have fewer flaws. In some cases, design thinking produced a 310 percent return on investment. One of the great strengths of design thinking is that it puts the point of view of the user or the client or the customer at the center of the process. This works for businesses and it works for governments. The world is full of great ideas and products that didn’t catch on because the people who designed them didn’t understand the user or the customer well enough. Human beings don’t actively seek out information that contradicts what we already believe. It’s a cognitive shortcut called confirmation bias. We double down on what we already think. Design thinking ensures that we seek out disconfirming data and pay attention to the contrarians. Only then can we honestly assess the value of our ideas.

THE DESIGN THINKING PROCESS IS ITERATIVE, WHICH IS HOW YOU SOLVED PROBLEMS AS A CHILD. WHEN YOU BUILT A TREE HOUSE, YOU TRIED SOMETHING, IT DIDN’T WORK QUITE RIGHT, SO YOU TRIED SOMETHING ELSE UNTIL YOU HAD A TREE HOUSE. YOU CREATED A SOLUTION, BUT THEN YOU CREATED A BETTER ONE, AND AN EVEN BETTER ONE AFTER THAT. Who is design thinking for? Good design can be done by anyone once they learn the process. I know of some great design thinking being taught at the architecture school and medical school at UVA. It is even taught in some elementary schools. One of my favorite design thinking success stories is probably in your closet right now. Procter & Gamble wanted to make a better detergent for cleaning floors, so they had some designers, called ethnologists in design thinking, go into people’s houses to see how they actually cleaned. It was hard to observe people mopping in their natural habitat. Often people wouldn’t allow people in unless their floor was already clean. Eventually they observed that people spent more time cleaning their mop than they did cleaning their floors. Procter & Gamble eliminated that mop-cleaning time by inventing the Swiffer, which is a $500 million a year business. In writing the book, did you have any personal aha moments? I co-authored the book with Darden Professor Jeanne Liedtka and Daisy Azer, a lecturer at Darden. Jeanne is the brain and I’m the mouth. She devised a system that helps provide people with the psychological safety they need to become innovators. One of the main messages of the book is about communicating the POV of the people who use systems, so that their POV can be at the core of the problem-solving process. Often, we get a lot of numbers and general information that lay out the constraints of a problem. But sometimes what we need is a personal story, something that connects us to the experience of a person and allows us to empathize with their situation. We don’t know what we don’t Charlottesville writer and know. Often we don’t know why former UVA communications people behave how they behave. professor Randy Salzman has We need to know the why, if we are co-authored a book on the going to design solutions that work. concept of design thinking.

C-BIZ 21

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The Pitch > Reboot

Thinking outside the box(er) Max Boxxer rebrands for the future By Lisa Martin

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After two decades in business, Max Boxxer founder Richard Crisler says that he’s ready to revitalize the brand and capitalize on web commerce.

PHOTOS: SANJAY SUCHAK

ntrepreneur and Max Boxxer founder Richard Crisler is a man for all seasons, but summer might suit him best. His first business endeavor was Yo Wear, launched at Duke University when he was a student, which produced Duke- and fraternity-themed boxer shorts that sold on campus and through fraternal organization magazines. “After I graduated and moved to Charlottesville, I opened a shop on the mall [where the Spectacle Shop is now],” says Crisler, “and made all kinds of clothing.” He had to learn the retail storefront business on the fly, and as he puts it, “it was absolute torture.” Seeking a more profitable path, he closed the shop after a year and pivoted to focus solely on selling colorful “vintage’ boxers and Hawaiian-style aloha shirts and tees via wholesale to retail stores and mail-order catalogs. “I had two boxer dogs, and man’s best friend and dependable clothing are both good connotations,” he says. His brand, dubbed Max Boxxer, moved to the head of the pack in 1988. The first 10 years boomed as sales grew to $1 million, with a staff of 13 who produced the garments in Crisler’s long, low-slung warehouse on River Road. Like the weather, however, changes in the business climate are inevitable. “Due to market forces and just plain inexperience on my part, it all began to slow down,” says Crisler. When sales trailed off, finally crashing along with the 2008 market, Crisler pivoted again, this time to solar panel installation with a new venture called SunDay Solar, and Max Boxxer went dormant. “By 2010 we had given up the wholesale but kept the retail direct to consumers via catalogs,” he says. “We’ve kept some residual customers all along, and now we’re looking to revitalize our brand and improve our internet business.” Enter Stephanie Lugus, a senior at Virginia Commonwealth University, fashion major, and Max Boxxer intern. “What Stephanie has done is to create a sense of organization on our website,” says Crisler, “where before it was a hodgepodge.” Earlier iterations allowed customers to order clothing à la carte, choosing any fabric/garment combination, and sizing was not always standardized across old and new lines.

Lugus, who has particular affinities for branding and digital marketing, tackled the problems at the root. “We went deeply into product development,” she says, “and figured out sizing that fits,” as opposed to the large, boxy styles that used to be en vogue. “Originally, the print collection was based on gift market and holiday wear, but now we have more of an everyday line, including lots of super fun boxers,” with themes from “jungle birds mix” to “spicy hot chilies” and many more.

“The original Boxxer mascot was based on drawings by Doug Payne that feature a very cool, collected, expat dog sporting a suit and top hat, but underneath he’s wearing fun boxers, and that’s what we want people to relate to,” says Lugus. The company is focused on revamping its online presence to streamline the consumer experience, boost marketing, and increase social media exposure. “One struggle is that we don’t yet have any analytics,” she says, “but once we start getting numbers from the new website, we can identify our buyers and go from there.” The Max Boxxer crew is optimistic heading into the holidays, and plans to launch a women’s line in the spring. Unique selling points include combed cotton fibers, coconut buttons, and hand-stitching all done locally in an entirely solar-powered facility. “This building has 262 solar panels on it,” says Crisler of his production warehouse. “Even the A/C and heating are powered by the sun.” That seems fitting for Crisler, who likes life on the sunny side.

C-BIZ 23

LET’S CREATE JOBS, BUILD BRIDGES, ENSURE PROSPERITY. LET’S MEASURE UP. Founded and headquartered in Charlottesville, CFA Institute understands the power of community connection to increase prosperity for all. As the steward and champion of the investment management industry, we put people at the heart of everything we do to create a stable financial foundation for a better world. Learn how at letsmeasureup.org 24 C-BIZ

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Zion Station, Central Virginia’s new premier business address. Conveniently located off I64 at Zion Crossing (Rts 250&15) between Richmond & Charlottesville. Zion Station, Central Virginia’s new premier business address. loMain entrance at established cross-over. For saleConveniently or Build-to-suit. cated off I64 at Zion Crossing (Rts 250&15) between Richmond & Charlottesville. DIRECTIONS: Exitat atestablished Rt 15 from cross-over. I64; take RtFor 15 sale south; right onto Rt 250 West; Main entrance or turn Build-to-suit. property on right; look for Zion Station Sign. DIRECTIONS: ExitSTATION at Rt 15 from -I64; take Rt south; LEFT! turn right onto Rt 250 West; ZION ONLY 2 15 LOTS Zion Station, Central Virginia’s new premier business address. Conveniently loproperty on right; look for Zion Station Sign. cated off I64 at Zion (Rts 250&15) between Richmond & Charlottesville. 4933Crossing RICHMOND Lots 4, 3,ROAD 6 & 10 -ROAD PENDING 4933 RICHMOND Main entrance at established cross-over. For sale or Build-to-suit. Zion Station, Central Virginia’s new premier business address. Conveniently lo- address. STILL Lots 4, 3, 6 & 10 -AVAILABLE: PENDING Zion Station, Central new premier business DIRECTIONS: Exit Zion at RtCrossing 15 from (Rts I64; take Rt 15 south;Virginia’s turn right onto Rt 250 West; catedLot off I64 250&15) between Richmond & Charlottesville. 10 at - 2.02 Acres $303,300 • Lot 1 1.13 Acres $168,750 Conveniently located off I64 at Zion Crossing (Rts 250 & 15) STILL AVAILABLE: property on right; look for Zion Station Sign. Main entrance at established cross-over. ForRichmond sale or Build-to-suit. between & Charlottesville. Lot 10 - 2.02Exit Acres • Lot 1 -south; 1.13 Acres - $168,750 DIRECTIONS: at Rt -15$303,300 from I64; take Rt 15 turn right onto Rt 250 West;

ZION STATION - ONLY 3 LOTS LEFT! Lots 3, 6look & 10for - PENDING property on 4, right; Zion Station Sign. ALBEMARLE COUNTY STILL AVAILABLE: ALBEMARLE or Build-to-suit. Lots 4, 3, 6 & COUNTY 10 - PENDING Lot 10 - 2.02 Acres - $303,300 • Lot 1 -For 1.13sale Acres - $168,750

DIRECTIONS: Exit at Rt 15 from I64; take Rt 15 south; turn right ont Rt 250 West; property on right; look for Zion Station Sign.

PROFFITT ROAD

Lots 3, 4, 6 - PENDING WORTH CROSSING SEMINOLE SQUARE STILL AVAILABLE:

Lots 1, 10 and 11 STILL AVAILABLE, call agent for details. PROFFITT ROAD Lot 10 -ALBEMARLE CROSSING SQUARE 2.02WORTH Acres - $303,300 • Lot 1 - 1.13 AcresSEMINOLE - $168,750 COUNTY

ALBEMARLE COUNTY

Zion Station, Central Virginia’s new premier business address. Conveniently loROAD WORTH CROSSING SEMINOLE SQUARE catedPROFFITT off I64 at Zion Crossing (Rts 250&15) between Richmond & Charlottesville. Main entrance at established cross-over. For sale or Build-to-suit. PROFFIT ROAD PROFFITT ROAD WORTH CROSSING SEMINOLE SQUARE DIRECTIONS: Exit at Rt 15 from I64; take Rt 15 south; turn right onto Rt 250 West; property on right; look for Zion Station Sign. Lots 4, 3, 6 & 10 - PENDING STILL AVAILABLE: Lot 10 - 2.02 Acres - $303,300 • Lot 1 - 1.13 Acres - $168,750 3.41 Acres - $1,955,000 3.43 Acres - $1,964,173 194 Zan Road 3.4129 Acres - $1,955,000 3.43 Acresto- Forest $1,964,173 194 Zan Road Seminole Square Shopping Center Rte. North to Forest Lakes Shopping 29 North Lakes. Turn right onto Seminole Square Shopping Center Rte. 29Center. North to Forest Lakes Shopping 29 NorthProffit to Forest Lakes. onto For Sale For Lease Property borders Proffit Rd. and Road. TurnTurn rightright onto Worth CrossBetween The Bike Factory and For Sale

ALBEMARLE COUNTY

3.41 Acres - $1,955,000 3.43 Acres - $1,964,173 194 Zan Road Center. Property Proffit Rd. andShopping Proffit Road. Turn onto Worth CrossBetween The Bike Factory andJewelers. Square Shopping Center Rte. borders 29Worth North to Forest Lakes 29 North toright Forest Lakes. Turn right Crossing. ing. Second property ononto right. Seminole Andrew Minton 3.41 Acres $1,955,000 3.43 Acres $1,964,173 194 Zan Road Worth Crossing. ing. Second right. AndrewThe Minton Jewelers. PROFFITT ROAD WORTH CROSSING SEMINOLE SQUARE Center. Property borders Proffit Rd. and Proffit Road.property Turn righton onto Worth CrossBetween Bike Factory and Call Agent for Details Co-Listed Steve Runkle, Seminole Square Shopping Center Rte. 29 North to Forest Lakes Shopping 29 North to Forestwith Lakes. Turn right onto Call Agent forJewelers. Details Worth Crossing. ing.with Second propertyRunkle, on right. Andrew Minton Co-Listed Steve Center. Property borders Proffit Rd. and Worth Crossing.

Sara Schroeder CallCall SaraCall Schroeder Sara Schroeder

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Rte. 29 North to Forest Lakes Shopping Center. Property borders Proffit Rd. and Worth Crossing. o

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HasBrouck Commercial HB HasBrouck Commercial HasBrouck Commercial 3.43 Acres - $1,964,173 HasBrouck

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1233 Cedars Court 1233Cedars Cedars Court 1233 Court Charlottesville, Va 22903 Charlottesville, Va 22903 Charlottesville, Va 22903 1233 Cedars Court Charlottesville, Va 22903

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Although Walter had entrepreneurial experience, he was new to composting. He hired Craig Coker of Coker Composting and Consulting as a technical advisor, and Coker helped Walter figure out what kind of facility he wanted to open, and how much space it would need. They settled on “turned windrow composting,” which involves piling organic waste in long rows, which are turned to improve porosity and oxygen content as well as control moisture and temperature. The method is well-suited to large volumes of compost. Coker also helped Walter navigate the permitting process at Virginia’s Department of Environmental Quality. Walter met department officials to share the company’s intentions, operational plans, and approach. “Our regulators wanted to see composting facilities succeed,” says Walter. “Establishing a good working relationship is critical.” Black Bear Composting would serve Charlottesville and the central Shenandoah Valley, which included four small cities with a combined population of about 150,000. The area also had a large potential market for the finished compost in agriculture and land development businesses. Walter and Coker went looking for land on which to build the facility—30 to 40 acres with good buffers from neighboring properties. Walter met with economic development offices in several counties to introduce his business concept and get advice about appropriate locations. “The officials steered us clear of areas already intended for future development, shared their GIS resources for programmatic search, and even identified local businesses that might benefit from our services,” says Walter. Many property owners were wary of having a composting facility nearby. So Walter went doorto-door with his plans and photographs of similar facilities to assuage neighbors’ concerns. Still, the first location Walter wanted to buy fell through after a public hearing.

Craving a job that felt more rewarding, Eric Walter sold the tech business he'd built over 15 years and launched Black Bear Composting. It took a year for him to find the 47 acres in Crimora where he eventually established Black Bear. The land was zoned agricultural, but required a special-use permit because commercial composting is not listed as an approved agricultural activity. The permit mandated a public hearing; despite Walter’s outreach, many people raised objections to the facility. Walter feared the panel of elected supervisors would not allow him to buy the land. Then a director from the regional Department of Environmental Quality stepped forward to speak at the hearing. He addressed the concerns that had been raised and explained that his office would closely regulate the operations of the facility. If anything went wrong, his office would deal with it, the regulator said. “Had it not been for our regulator foreseeing the need to speak at this meeting, Black Bear Composting would never have had the opportunity to start,” says Walter.

Black Bear Composting had to start small; the facility was only big enough to process 2,800 tons per year. (That’s a lot of weight, but it’s not that much for a commercial operation—a “medium-sized” facility often processes 10,000 tons per year.) The tractor did double-duty as a loader and pulled a windrow turner. Walter kept equipment to a minimum and bought secondhand when he could. Instead of buying a watertight truck specially designed for composting, he decided to use 65-gallon wheeled carts that could be driven around in a stake body truck. Now Walter just needed to find clients who wanted their organic waste hauled away. Because there weren’t any other local commercial composters, he had to start from scratch. In October 2011, Black Bear Composting officially opened, but it had no clients, no organic waste to work with, and no finished compost to sell. Luckily, Walter got an out-of-the-blue call from the University of Virginia, which became his first big client. The university’s sustainability efforts have been lauded in the past few years as exemplary among American universities, and far more ambitious than the city’s own sustainability efforts. In 2011, the Board of Visitors made a commitment to several environmental goals, including responsible waste management—it seems that the UVA Office of Sustainability was waiting for a business like Walter’s to open.

The breaking point

JOHN ROBINSON

The beginning

JOHN ROBINSON

a

fter selling the tech business he’d built over 15 years, Eric Walter wanted to do something more rewarding. “More fulfilling spiritually,” he says. “Out from behind a desk and outside.” His Chicago tech business, Gorilla, had Patagonia as a client. “Sustainability infused everything they do,” says Walter. “That changed something for me.” After considering a few different environmentally sustainable business ventures, Walter founded a food scrap-composting facility and compost-hauling business. “I’d always been a recycler,” he says. “And I liked that composting physically turns waste into a cool end product.” Black Bear Composting, which launched in 2011, remains the only local commercial composting business. Though the company partially closed in 2016, Walter brought it back from the brink of extinction by adjusting his business model and working with his clients to build a company that is sustainable, in all senses of the word.

Black Bear, which launched in 2011, remains the only local commercial composting business.

Four years later, Black Bear Composting’s clients included two state universities, a college, three public school systems, several private schools, three hospitals, several restaurants and corporate offices, a couple grocery stores, a few local festivals, and a national park. The company also had a residential compost collection program whose popularity was growing by word of mouth. Black Bear Composting had a great reputation, CONTINUED ON PAGE 32

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 31

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and the company’s finished compost—rich soil that is excellent for growing plants—always sold out. Small farmers, home gardeners, and natural turf and lawn professionals were big fans. The facility had composted more than 7,900 tons of material since its inception. About 50,000 students at the schools that Black Bear Composting served had learned about the ecological benefits of composting through the company’s outreach. “Sounds great, right?” says Walter. In reality, revenues often didn’t cover the company’s capital and operating expenses. His business, Walter realized, was really two businesses: a composting facility and a hauler. The facility side wasn’t profitable. There wasn’t enough organic waste; they weren’t even at the 2,800 tonsper-year capacity that the land could handle. What had gone wrong? Charlottesville produces an estimated 90,000 tons of food waste per year, according to a 2010 waste characterization report created with a GIS tool at Virginia Tech. (That’s enough organic material to fill Black Bear’s facility more than 32 times.) Instead of going to Walter’s facility, some of that food waste went to feedlots. Grain from local micro-breweries went to cattle feedlots. National supermarket chains had contracts with large-scale haulers that brought organics to feedlots. More importantly, disposing of waste in landfills is cheap and easy in Virginia. Local landfills are accessible and charge between $45 and $65 per ton. Black Bear Composting couldn’t undercut landfill pricing. “Virginia is the second largest garbage importing state,” says Walter. “Landfills are big business here.” Most significant of all, there was little political will to make commercial composting economically viable in Virginia. Though localities have targets for recycling, there are no consequences for failing to meet those targets. Unlike many neighboring states, Virginia doesn’t even ban disposing of yard trimmings in landfills. In December 2016, Black Bear Composting’s facility stopped accepting new organic material. Walter planned to stay open to sell finished compost until Memorial Day or until it sold out, whichever came first.

Rebirth

Walter told his clients that he would keep the hauling side of the business open for as long as he could. But he’d have to bring their organic materials farther away, which would be more expensive, and they’d have to pay other facilities—which had higher fees—to take the materials. “We were in limbo for a year,” says Walter. He kept hauling for his core clients and brought their materials to transfer points that eventually sent organic waste to facilities in Lynchburg and Waverly. “That experience taught us our true costs. And it also taught us that some of our clients were willing to pay those higher prices because they believed in composting.” It was through Walter’s core clients that he was able to reopen. He had to raise his prices,

“I FEEL STRANGELY LIBERATED BY THE NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE OF THE BUSINESS."

JOHN ROBINSON

ERIC WALTER

Eric Walter readjusts a cover that regulates humidity and temperature for the compost pile. but his clients stuck by him. “It’s a one-day-ata-time process,” says Walter. “I’m doing everything I can to keep costs down, be more efficient. Automate and optimize where I can.” But in many ways, the composting business requires the human touch. Composting is very susceptible to contamination and machines can’t sort through organic material. These days, Walter likes his daily work. “I’m never in an office. I don’t even have one,” he says. “I’m on the road or at our facility or testing products or taking samples to labs or helping manage the windrows.” Walter often drives a truck and goes on a collection route. He likes talking to clients. And what do Walter’s clients think? Mike Keenan, who founded The Juice Laundry, met Walter at the C’ville Eco Fair in 2013, before Keenan opened his first retail location. Because Keenan knew that composting services were available, he planned ahead to make certain that his business would be as sustainable as possible. “In addition to bottling all of our juices in reusable

glass bottles, we use only plant-based, compostable cups and bowls for 100 percent of our smoothies, soups, and acai bowls,” says Keenan. “Absolutely critical for businesses that purchase and use compostable materials is having an industrial compost facility like Black Bear that can actually compost all of these items.” Keenan partly attributes The Juice Laundry’s ability to be zero-waste to Black Bear Composting. The City Market has a composting booth that Laurie Miller staffs for Black Bear Composting. “People who visit the compost booth are excited that the city offers this service,” says Miller. Black Bear Composting’s residential clients number around 300 in Charlottesville, Staunton, Albemarle, and Augusta. The company has four employees, including Walter. It has three trucks, though Walter is looking to buy a new one, an industrial-sized truck with a watertight tank uniquely designed for organic material. “Because organic waste is water-based, a lot of it disappears as you process it,” Walter says.

At the facility, every ton of food waste needs to be mixed with two tons of wood chips or leaves. “Half of it is water, so it goes up into the air as steam. By the end, you only have 40 percent of it left as finished compost.” In the beginning, Walter thought that it might make sense to take the organic material for free and just charge for the finished product. “But the more realistic business model is to make sure that you can cover your expenses by charging for removal and processing,” he says. “Sale of the finished compost is profit, hopefully.” Walter is upbeat—a surprise, considering the challenges of the past few years. “I feel strangely liberated by the near-death experience of the business,” he says. “I spent years being afraid of what would happen to our employees if we went under. It’s not a high profit margin business and it’s never is going to be.” But he was able to carry on even when the worst happened. “There are no guarantees. We do a good job. Our clients are fantastic. That’s pretty much all I can ask for.”

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Mike Appleby figured he’d keep his big city job when he moved to Charlottesville. Appleby’s Boston-based employer kept him on to run a development team when he moved to C’ville to get married. But Appleby quickly came to love the area—“it’s the nicest place I’ve seen anywhere,” he says—and five years later he hatched a plan with an associate to launch a local company. Appleby started his manufacturing business, Mikro Systems, in January 2001 with just three employees. Today, the firm has 130 in-house employees, and another 70 build Mikro’s high-tech investment casting cores at a nearby Siemens plant. Appleby came to Albemarle County because it’s a place where he wanted to live. He stayed in no small part because he believes it’s a good place to do business. “We loved it here—we loved the community and we wanted to be a part of the community,” Appleby says. “This isn’t the manufacturing mecca of America, but it’s still a great area to build a company.”

BY THE NUMBERS

As business owner drawn to Charlottesville for personal reasons, Appleby’s not alone. From biotech mavens to tech geeks to restaurateurs, entrepreneurs have taken to the area like businessmen to suits. Almost to a person, they say it’s the quality of life more than the commercial climate that initially made them open up shop. “I didn’t move here to start companies,” says Michael Prichard, who founded WillowTree in 2008 and has since moved on to start a new firm, Metis Machine. “I was like a lot of people I know who have come here for another reason.”

GETTING IT RIGHT

Greene says entrepreneurship is in this town’s blood. “Charlottesville has been known since the days of Jefferson to have an entrepreneurial focus and to be encouraging of entrepreneurs,” she says. What it takes to keep that going is building on success, cultivating individuals willing to take risks, and investing in those risks, she says. All that’s starting to snowball. In early 2016, the National Venture Capital Association named Charlottesville the fastest-growing venture capital ecosystem in the United States. The organization reports that from 2010 to 2015, venture funding increased from $250,000 to $27.7 million in Charlottesville, one of many cities nationwide to experience a boom in venture capital investments. Where only one local start-up received venture

EZE AMOS

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Travis Wilburn, co-owner of Stay Charlottesville, says when he started renting homes to C’ville visitors in 2007, he didn’t know what to expect of the local business climate. “I’ve been here since 2000, and I accidentally fell into my own business,” Wilburn says. “We built a guest house out back, and we have become a hospitality group as Charlottesville has evolved.” But while they may have arrived for other reasons, many have found Charlottesville to be a great place to start a business. According to the Charlottesville Regional Chamber of Commerce, between 2007 and 2010, private enterprise jobs grew more than twice as fast locally (9.23 percent) than in the rest of the state (4.61 percent). Greater Charlottesville has grown faster than the rest of Virginia in eight of 10 private enterprise industry sectors, including natural resources and mining, leisure and hos-

Charlottesville Angel Network founder Tracey Greene says Charlottesville’s entrepreneurs thrive thanks to its mature angel network, rather than the kind of corporate support on which larger cities rely.

pitality, construction and manufacturing, and financial activities, among others. In summer 2016, Entrepreneur magazine ranked Charlottesville No. 4 on its list of 50 top cities for entrepreneurs, a ranking that takes into account cost of living, business tax rates, percentage of college grads, well-paying job growth, and number of venture capital deals. According to Tracey Greene of the Charlottesville Angel Network, which has invested $6.5 million in 32 tech companies since it launched in 2015, C’ville has a unique infrastructure in place that other cities don’t have. “Take the Richmond area, which I have looked at tangentially,” she says. “A lot of start-up companies come to Charlottesville because of the assets we have that they don’t. They have more corporate support, but they don’t have as mature an angel network as we have.”

funds in 2010, by 2015, nine saw significant investments. Firms like Jaffray Woodriff’s Felton Group and Greene’s Angel Network have anchored the investments in technology-based businesses. The Community Investment Collaborative has played a similar role in the service industry. The city is taking steps to seed small businesses of all types. Through the Office of Economic Development’s Advancing Charlottesville Entrepreneurs Program, C’ville has assisted more than 70 businesses over the past five years. The grant program provides funding for advertising, equipment, and supplies. The OED’s GO Hire program also provides grant funding, with a focus on attracting, training, and retaining employees. Brendan Richardson, who co-founded satellite image data firm Astraea in 2016, has taken advantage of such local funding. In 2017, Astraea CONTINUED ON PAGE 41

C-BIZ 37

Students, start your engines UVA really, really wants students to start companies. At least, that’s our conclusion after learning about all the programs on Grounds that nurture young entrepreneurs. Of course the major hotbeds at UVA for those with a business bent are the Darden School of Business, home to 900 graduate students, and its Batten Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. But there are a number of smaller centers, too. Like…

HackCville

If you’re a UVA student with a startup dream, you’re probably already a member of HackCville, which nurtures hundreds of future tech/design/ media pros within two clubhouses on the Corner and a tight-knit community, locally and virtually. Members can access hands-on skills courses, howto-launch workshops, summer internships, and field trips to cities around the country where they connect with business-minded alums.

iLab at UVA

From next-gen spinal surgery techniques to single-serve bake-at-home desserts, new companies nurtured by UVA’s iLab cover a lot of ground. A cross-grounds program primarily funded by the Batten Institute at Darden, the iLab offers 10,000 square feet of workspace, mentoring and net-

working for entrepreneurs and innovators—plus a 10-week entrepreneurial boot camp. Since 2000, the iLab incubator program has provided 250 companies with more than $1.5 million in grants.

OpenGrounds at UVA

Launched in 2012, OpenGrounds aims to bridge disciplines to help solve the world’s toughest problems. Under its umbrella, an extremely diverse group of projects take place—from design proposals addressing water pollution in India to biology-based robotics. OpenGrounds showcases such projects at annual festivals and sponsors film screenings, discussions, and publications that foster creative collaboration.

Galant Center for Entrepreneurship

Galant is the McIntire School of Commerce’s cradle for entrepreneurship. It offers speakers,

start-up trips to Silicon Valley and various East Coast cities, and a pitch competition that has funneled more than $1.5 million to UVA-affiliated ventures.

SE@UVA

Would-be social entrepreneurs come to SE@ UVA for the chance to kick-start their careers in global problem-solving. The program runs its own pitch competition, brings in speakers, and sponsors study-abroad opportunities, like a trip to Dominica to observe social entrepreneurship in action (think organic farms and sustainable tourism).

Pike Fellows Program

Three to five teams of engineering-student entrepreneurs each year are selected to be Pike fellows. They get intensive support and mentoring, plus up to $5,000 in seed money for projects based on novel technologies—and they can compete in an annual spring competition for the $50,000 Pike Award for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

UVA Licensing and Ventures Group

The LVG is the pipeline by which scientific discoveries made at UVA—many of them medical technologies—receive patents and are brought to market. The group connects industry with UVAbased innovators, and hooks investors up with growing companies. UVA itself, via a $10 million seed fund created in 2015, is also an investor, with the fund being managed by LVG.

UVA E-Cup

The E-Cup (that’s E for Entrepreneur) is an annual competition in which UVA students at all levels can put forward their ideas—and those ideas don’t even have to be fully fleshed out. The “Concept” stage of the competition doesn’t require a business plan or a firmed-up team, while other stages demand that students develop their plan more thoroughly. Do it right and competitors can walk away with first place and $20K.

STEPHEN BARLING

UVA Lighthouse & Works in Progress

iLab at UVA 38 C-BIZ

Students who want to talk over their entrepreneurial projects with other innovators—possibly in the middle of the night—can take advantage of Lighthouse, a 24/7 “entrepreneurial workspace” and the home of Works In Progress, a community of peers in the startup realm. Personal relationships—including with dedicated staff members—are the emphasis here.

SANJAY SUCHAK

Ty Cooper

“A lot young professionals move away to big cities and then venture back to build their families,” she says. “We have such a high quality of life. It’s a place where people want to work and live. They want to come to a city that has a slower pace of life, where you can breathe and feel the air in your lungs but still have that liveliness.” And while Greene notes technology firms have spearheaded the entrepreneurial growth in Charlottesville in recent years, she says every tech job requires at least four traditional jobs for support. “You have all these jobs—baristas and restaurants, lawyers and accountants, retail shops—and it takes all of that,” she says. “Tech bolsters an entire ecosystem.” Ty Cooper provides some of that support via his digital marketing and events firm Lifeview Marketing. He says smaller communities like Charlottesville bring a loyalty that larger metro areas don’t. “They tend to support who they know,” he says. “If there is a builder who’s local that can only build for three times as much, they are going to use an outside builder. But when it comes down to it, they support people in their own community. You see that in most smaller markets; it’s more intimate.” Prichard says Charlottesville punches above its weight when it comes to filling skilled labor positions. CONTINUED ON PAGE 43

Helping hands

By partnering with business owners, SCORE gets results By Joanna Breault

“Sometimes there is something we are working on and other times he just checks in with me,” Van Camp says. “It’s nice because small business ownership can be really lonely. There’s nobody giving me raises or patting me on the back. There are no incentive trips. So it’s nice to have that person who is saying, ‘You are doing a great job, I’m proud of you, let’s have lunch.’ I got really lucky.” This kind of encouragement and help is the heartbeat of SCORE, which has 300 chapters nationwide. Since the 1980s, the central Virginia chapter of SCORE has been headquartered in Charlottesville’s Chamber of Commerce building, serving Charlottesville and eight counties beyond. The chapter currently boasts 18 volunteers; they are mostly retired businesspeople now seeking to make a difference through mentorship. In the past year, SCORE of Central Virginia has taken on 271 new cases. “We are there for the whole story,” says local SCORE chairman Bob Lenahan. “We are there at the very beginning, and we are there when they

L

aura Van Camp’s mind was buzzing with a hundred details and no small amount of entrepreneurial zeal when Steve Cooper asked her one simple question: “How many pairs of jeans do you need to sell each day to succeed?” The question brought her down to earth; it was both grounding and practical, just like Steve. “I walked into that meeting with Steve—like I know other entrepreneurs walk into a mentorship relationship—and you just want people to be automatically on board, to be in the moment with you,” Van Camp says. “But you really need to take it to the very beginning. That’s what Steve did with me. He helped ground me and make sure I built a foundation first.” Van Camp owns Jean Theory, a downtown boutique carrying designer denim and staffed by employees obsessed with matching customers to perfectly fitting jeans. Before she opened the doors nine years ago, she began meeting with Cooper, a retired employee of Hughes Aircraft Company who had been highly successful in business. Cooper helped Van Camp project revenues and expenses for her first year, do research on Charlottesville demographics, put together a profit and loss statement, and prepare for small business loan meetings with banks. It sounds like a mentorship match made in heaven, but it was actually a match made by the Central Virginia chapter of SCORE, a nationwide organization of mentors devoted to Jean Theory owner Laura Van Camp says the SCORE mentorship program, which paired her with retired supporting small business businessman Steve Cooper, helped establish a solid foundation for her now decade-old business. owners. Any aspiring entrepreneur in the organization’s footprint, at any point in launching a business, can apply for mentorship through open their business. If they have cash flow problems, SCORE. Each applicant is matched with a menif they have employee problems, we are still with tor who will take them through a structured yet them; we are still available to help.” personalized process of planning and starting In addition to ongoing mentorship, SCORE their business. The mentor and client decide offers workshops on such topics as social media upon the duration and frequency of meetings marketing, how new tax laws affect businesses, and all mentoring services are completely free. and how to deal with sexual harassment and disAfter almost a decade, Van Camp and Cooper crimination issues in the workplace. For more still meet regularly. information, check out centralvirginia.score.org. JOHN ROBINSON

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 39

received $1,000 per new hire via state funding, and the city matched the grant. “It’s been great,” Richardson says. “I wouldn’t say that it is by any means the primary motivator for hiring—that’s growth and customer growth— but it helps to offset recruitment costs.” Richardson says the University of Virginia is critical for Charlottesville’s entrepreneurial evolution. The school helps produce not only significant amounts of intellectual property that leads to commercial tech, but also individuals willing to stay in the community and build their businesses. Some of those individuals, though, take a winding path to setting up shop, according to Greene.

C-BIZ 39

Technical details

estate that makes networking easier (and comes with phones), plus structured events and mentorship for new entrepreneurs. WillowTree and Relay Foods are both onetime clients, along with a dozen or so others. Founder Gary Henry names “counseling and connections” as the most important benefits CTI offers.

Machine

An incubator in a flexible space that it shares with CBIC and the Charlottesville Angel Network, Machine has facilitated more than $5 million in investments for six local startups since 2016. While Machine itself isn’t an investor, says Alex Goodman, who runs it, “We’ve helped [companies] realize funding success in their early days.” Machine also offers office space, mentorship and other in-kind benefits to startups that successfully complete its application process.

COURTESY GIRLS WHO CODE

Charlottesville Women In Tech

Girls Who Code Startups in Charlottesville need not feel alone—there is a raft of organizations standing ready to offer help and guidance. A person could stay very busy attending all the tech-related meetups and programs in town, pressing the flesh with possible investors along the way. Here’s a rundown of some resources local entrepreneurs can tap.

Charlottesville Business Innovation Council

A networking group with a 21-year history—in this game, that’s a long time—CBIC is the force behind a long list of local tech events. Its annual awards gala recognizes companies, startups, and innovators (Mikro Systems took Business of the Year in 2018) that are pushing the local tech industry forward. CBIC also runs a Tech Tour to introduce students to tech companies; casual happy-hour mixers; amped-up espresso discussions; and more formal panel events. It’s all meant to support entrepreneurs, build community, and foster learning.

Cville Bio Hub

The Bio Hub promotes Charlottesville as a hotbed for biotech innovation—by its own count, the industry employees 1,800 people in the area. More than 60 organizations are members of the Bio Hub, which hosts forums on topics like cancer research and locally developed pharmaceuticals.

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Organized in 2016, the Bio Hub won an $80,000 grant in August from the GO Virginia Initiative to continue growing the biotech industry here and attract top talent.

Charlottesville Open Bio Labs

A nonprofit focused on training locals to take part in a growing biotech industry, Open Bio Labs offers a lab space—stocked with everything from a 3D printer to spectrophotometers—that’s open to the public. Members can use the lab and enjoy discounts on Open Bio Labs’ courses, which are aimed at both K-12 students and adults. Mentorship for real-world projects—startup companies, scientific papers, and personal science quests—is part of the mission, too.

Charlottesville Technology Incubator

Office space on the Downtown Mall, if you’re a startup, is a pretty good deal. Founded in 2009, CTI provides fledgling tech companies prime real

Aiming to make Charlottesville safe and friendly to female techies, four-year-old CWIT sponsors a series of monthly meetups for local women in the tech field. Providing “much-needed networking time for women,” says board vice president Kim Wilkens, the meetups have proven so popular that this year they grew into a one-day conference, the SWITCH ON! Summit held November 9. Meanwhile, CWIT also runs programming for K-12 girls through its TwechGirls initiative, reaching more than 600 local girls last year. High school students can even get hands-on with real biotech research through the Bio-Med Tech-Girls summer program. Sounds like girl power to us.

Center for Innovative Technology

The Herndon, Virginia, office of CIT is an inspiration in itself—a striking, angular building made of reflective glass, the winning design in a 1985 competition. In the years since then, CIT has provided a wide range of tech-related services. Most relevant to entrepreneurs are its programs to connect Virginia-based startups with seed money and government contracts. Workshops and talks provide ideas and connections, too.

Neon Guild

If you’re a tech pro around here, chances are good you’re already part of the Neon Guild—it’s collected 450 members in its 22 years of existence. Guild members get together monthly for pizza, beer, and focused talks (October’s was on using storytelling skills to enhance user experience), and they stay in close communication via a lively email list. Dues-free and stripped-down, the Guild emphasizes personal connections and a casual tone.

First Wednesdays

Here’s another chance to mingle with techies once a month—in this case, at Champion Brewing Company. “No speakers, presentations, or slide decks,” promises the website: The idea’s just to chat with other folks interested in technology and business.

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 41

“I can’t speak to biotech or energy, which are doing really well, but for a tech company there are advantages in Charlottesville,” he says. “There are really smart people that want to live here because of the quality of life. You can find the right talent to join the team, and you can do it at a lower cost structure than you can in San Francisc0o.”

ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT

Charlottesville, of course, isn’t perfect when it comes to nurturing entrepreneurs. Being a smaller market means a smaller pool of customers, for starters, and it can be more difficult to convince outsiders that local companies are the real deal. “Sometimes there’s a perception of Charlottesville,” Prichard says. “It can be harder when you walk into a room with the bigger players.” That national perception took a hit after last year’s Unite the Right rallies, says OED director Chris Engel. But according to Engel, his office and others are working to combat that perception and keep investments flowing into C’ville. At the same time, Engel recognizes much of the strife in C’ville and beyond is due to economic opportunity, “or the lack thereof.” Cooper says encouraging diversity and assisting minority businesses is an area in which the city could improve. “The numbers are low on minority business,” he says. “But there has been talk about trying to change that.”

Getting started

How many entrepreneurs open up shop each quarter? A lot, it turns out. Since the beginning of 2015, the Charlottesville community has seen the start of 1,289 new businesses. 140 125 115

114 99

Michael Prichard

Greene says the community would also benefit from an “innovation front door.” While Charlottesville has no shortage of incubators and work spaces that invigorate entrepreneurs, folks in the tech business don’t have a place to go to be pointed in the right direction. For a manufacturing business like Appleby’s, workforce issues are at the forefront. He says the city would see manufacturing growth if it built a “pipeline of young people out of high school” that want to go into the trades. “We’re in the aerospace business, so we’ll be here for decades,” he says. “We need people who will roll up their sleeves and make parts.”

89

86

75

74

1st Q. 2nd Q. 3rd Q. 4th Q. 2016 2016 2016 2016

1st Q. 2nd Q. 3rd Q. 4th Q. 2017 2017 2017 2017

INFORMATION PROVIDED BY THE VIRGINIA EMPLOYMENT COMMISSION.

MARTYN KYLE

91 88

98

95

1st Q. 2nd Q. 3rd Q. 4th Q. 2015 2015 2015 2015

1st Q. 2018

Charlottesville start-ups by quarter Did you know? We have a lot of small businesses. The Charlottesville area has 5,214 firms with four employees or fewer. C-BIZ 41

City of Charlottesville The City of Charlottesville is seeking qualified individuals to join our team who are highly motivated and who strive for success by demonstrating Charlottesville's Core Values of Leadership, Trust, Creativity, Respect, and Excellence. Now accepting applications for full-time, temporary, and seasonal positions.

Fences | Decks | Railings | Porches Arbors & Pergolas | Handicap Ramps

The City employs Maintenance Workers, Police Officers, Administrative Professionals, Bus Operators, Recreation and Fitness Instructors, and much more who are dedicated to public service. Be part of our team and make a difference in the community! To view a complete list of current opportunities and to apply, visit:

www.charlottesville.org/jobs

28 Draft Avenue VATrail 27Stuarts WhiteDraft, Picket

Questions? Contact the HR Office: 434-970-3490

Mt. Crawford VA. 434-244-3556

540-564-1322 www.dutchway.com

Established in 1995

The City of Charlottesville is an Equal Opportunity Employer and Values Diversity at All Level of its Workforce.

www.dutchway.com Established 1995

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• Railings • Arbors & Pergolas • Porches • Handicap Ramps

Sentara Home Health – Charlottesville, VA

Registered Nurses & Licensed Practical Nurses

WE’RE HIRING! Join our team of caring, compassionate, professional nurses. Sentara Home Health offers Excellent Career Opportunities for Experienced RNs and LPNS! Enjoy Competitive Wages and Outstanding Benefits! Sign-on Bonus Available for Experienced RNs & LPNs. Must have a minimum of one year RN or LPN experience. Apply-on line today at www.sentaracareers.com Keyword: Home Care Services – All Positions

42 C-BIZ

Chat on-line with our Home Health Recruiter on Mondays from 9-10 a.m. https://app.brazenconnect.com/a/sentara/s/4vzg4/next

Sentara Home Health provides care for our patients in Charlottesville and surrounding areas, including Albemarle, Greene, Fluvanna, Orange, Louisa, Nelson and Madison Counties. Sentara Home Health has been ranked in the Top Ten Home Health Agencies in America by Home Care Magazine over the past several years.

mls ??????? mls 499612

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area,bathroom)and a 1 bedroom apartment on the 2nd floor • New roof,wall heat/ac units • Great front porch, private fenced yard and off-street parking.

$Price

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finished terrace level • Quiet country living, great mountain views • 25 minutes to the heart of Charlottesville

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BUYING or SELLING? CALL US! 5463 Seminole Trail

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MLS 575206

$595,000

Light filled, south-east facing top unit overlooking Highlands Express at Wintergreen Resort. 2BD/2BA unit features heated ceramic tile floors in the main living space, wood-burning fireplace and fantastic views. Walk to the slopes from your own mountain getaway!

MLS 583525 29 N Seminole Trail

Barracks Road

B3 zoning which allows for many uses! Frontage on rt 29 with access off of Lake Saponi Dr. 3.24 acres mostly open access to water and sewer. Close to the Holiday Inn Express and Shopping center on the Albemarle/Greene County Line.

Versatile .46 acre lot less than a mile from City boundary with public water and sewer available. RA zoning with partially paved driveway and sidewalks.

MLS 581526

$259,000 CVMLS 30195314 The Farms at Turkey Run are a unique enclave of 40 private country estates within an 800 acre haven surrounded by 5K acres of protected rural area that is Mount Ida Reserve. Spectacular views of the Blue Ridge Mountains, streams, ponds, rolling pasture and wooded areas. Only minutes to Monticello, wineries and more, and under 20 minutes from Charlottesville.

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Celt Road

Only minutes from town, UVA & Scott Stadium, on a private road just off RT 29 S within 3 miles of I64, you will find this 40 acre parcel of land with stream, awesome views and some open but mostly elevated wooded land very close to the Albemarle Reservoir.

MLS 575124

$439,000

240 Stribling Avenue 80 acres w/ loads of potential! Hidden Glen features beautifully laying, open land with scattered mature hardwoods and a picturesque wooded creek running through it that could be a great candidate for a conservation easement or subdivision in the raw.

MLS 532891

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MLS 558411

$168,000

$1,695,000

11 acres available near the University of Virginia. Potential residential development or private city estate.

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434.220.5656 | sloanmanis.com | 415 Fourth Street N.E. Charlottesville, VA 22902

44 C-BIZ

A Charlottesville job with a world of possibilities.

Of course you can move to NYC, or L.A., or Chicago… Or you can stay right here in Charlottesville and work in a place with a view and a really contemporary viewpoint. We’re WorldStrides, and we’ve been at home here for fifty years. In fact, today we’re 500 employees strong! This is where great work is done and friends are made. This is where careers take flight—right from the Downtown Mall. worldstrides.com/careers

C-BIZ 45

Backstory

D

uring the heyday of rail in the early 20th century, West Main Street grew into the principal hotel district in Charlottesville, and The Queen Charlotte Hotel, located across from the train station, was one of its crown jewels. The Queen Charlotte Hotel was originally the home of the Peyton family, who routinely opened their house to travelers. The property became such a popular overnight stay that a large addition was built on the street side of the house to provide

46 C-BIZ

more guest rooms. A fourth story was added to the building around 1915. As railroad traffic decreased and automobile culture rose, the hotels on West Main Street de-

The Queen Charlotte Hotel

THEN: Opened early 1920s NOW:

Parking lot

STEVE TRUMBULL, C’VILLE IMAGES

Stay a while

clined. Motels located conveniently by highways became more popular while downtown hospitality business slowed. Several hotels, like The Queen Charlotte in 1955, went under. The space the hotel once inhabited is now an empty parking lot, but in recent years, hotels have returned to West Main Street: The Graduate Charlottesville, The Draftsman, Courtyard by Marriott, and the Hampton Inn & Suites now line the venerable street between UVA and downtown.

ANN ARDEN HOME “Love it...my very favorite designs. Beautiful.....best ever.....anywhere.”

Leather Sofa by Bassett Furniture FREE interior design consultations HGTV Design Studio . Delivery 406 West Main Street, Downtown Waynesboro 1-540-949-5044 www.ANNARDENHOME.com Tuesday - Saturday 10-6 Financing Available

61st Annual Highland County

MAPLE FESTIVAL March 9-10 & 16-17 Visit the Official Maple Festival of the Commonwealth For more info on events, attractions, and activities visit

w w w.Hig h land C ounty.or g