The St. Maarten Chamber of Commerce & Industry recently concluded their First Annual Business Plan Competition with a Prize-Giving Ceremony on World Entrepreneurs Day last Friday, August 21st. The ceremony was held at the Chamber of Commerce and top finalists surrounded by family, friends and colleagues were awarded prizes which included laptops, cellular phones, printers, professional services and many more prizes generously donated by close to twenty-five companies.
The five finalists with the highest overall points were Sabrina Vrutaal for Educare Foundation, Nalajsha Agard for Creative Learning, Shawn York for 37 Square Miles SXM Clothing Apparel, Yannick Hodge for H&H General Cleaning and Maintenance N.V. and Shasa Lake of Sweetie Epicurean Icery Pops. The Best Marketing, Best Brand and Overall Winner categories were won by Sabrina Vrutaal while the Best Pitch and Most Likely to Succeed categories were won by Nalajsha Agard and Shawn York walked away as winner in the Best Business Plan category.
Points for each category was awarded after each of the top ten finalists pitched their business plans to a panel of five judges on Wednesday, August 19th. Following each presentation finalists were asked questions and given advice by judges Lesley Abalck of the Windward Islands Bank, Dwight Williams of FirstCaribbean Bank, Valya Lake-Pantophlet of the TEZVT Ministry, Jimmy Challenger of ORCO Bank and Eric Ellis of Nagico Insurances. The judges were impressed by the quality of the presentations and were greatly encourage by the talent displayed by the next generation of entrepreneurs.
Prior to judging, competition participants were invited to a workshop held at the University of St. Martin where Kenneth Lei of OBNA Bank and Carmen Richardson of the Small Business Development Foundation imparted wisdom on writing winning business plans and dressing for success. At the workshop, Chamber Board of Directors were also on hand to give the participants tips and share their own experiences and challenges in starting their businesses.
First Annual Business Plan Competition project was initiated by Board of Directors Member Nzinga Lake and was executed through the Chamber’s Business “Biz” Center. All participants were encouraged at the prize giving ceremony to continue to use the Biz Center as a resource to help them along their paths to success.