Orlando has long been recognized as a top destination for tourism. But in recent years our community has focused on highlighting other prevalent aspects of our economy. Understandably so. We have so much more to offer and as the Orlando Economic Partnership proclaimed years ago, “most don’t know the half of it”. The Orlando metro…
Recently my wife Lindsay and I were blessed with our greatest adventure yet…becoming parents. In our case we were blessed with a two for one deal and had twins! A beautiful boy and girl. Our journey to parenthood wasn’t easy, we “tried” for over 5 years, followed by a complicated pregnancy which included my wife…
Earlier this week I met with an entrepreneur that has had a business for quite sometime, but it has been very stagnant for years. He works a full time job and has never focused full time on the venture. Consequently the venture has not reached its potential. He wants to take his business to the…
In business it is often said that only the strong survive. The businesses that adapt to their environment the most effectively greatly increase their chances of surviving, or better yet thriving. But so do the companies resourceful enough to learn from them. Developing trade secrets, creating innovative offerings, and tracking market changes can take a lot of time,…
Over the last seven years, I have had the opportunity to work with and get to know Chris Gibbons, the founder of Economic Gardening. Economic Gardening is an entrepreneurial approach to economic development that focuses on growing second-stage companies within communities across the country, as compared to traditional economic development initiatives that focus on recruiting…
When I was in college at the University of Central Florida (Go Knights!) I was introduced to many leaders in the community who had been very successful entrepreneurs that transitioned into successful angel investors and/or venture capitalists. I had the opportunity to pitch many of these investors during business plan competitions. You could think of these competitions like SharkTank, before…
Have you caught the entrepreneurship bug yet? If not, now is the time…literally! Global Entrepreneurship week is kicking off this upcoming Monday, November 17th. Whether you are currently an entrepreneur, or aspire to become one, it is time to partake in the festivities with fellow entrepreneurs around the world…in other words it is time to get…
We all interpret the world in a unique way based on our past experiences, education, attitude, dominant thoughts, needs and goals. These factors act as a lens and shape our perception of what we experience which cause us to respond to people, events, and stress differently. Each of us also has natural character traits that…
The UCF LaunchPad always seems to have something cookin! Yesterday I was on campus for a lunch meeting and happened to walk through the Student Union. I decided to stop by the UCF LaunchPad, a center championing entrepreneurship on campus, to say hello and am glad I did. I was informed that John Rivers, the…
Today five years ago I decided to start Brand Advance. At the time I had a tech start-up with two other founders and we ran into some challenges raising capital. Investors in the Orlando area, like many other places around the country, were deploying their capital in real estate and buying up everything they could…