Meet Alley Weller and “Dude”. Ally is a member of the Armstrong Beef 4-H Club and approached Community Futures in the fall of 2015 to request financial assistance with her first steer project under our 4 H Youth Loan Program.  In the photo above taken in the month of May, Dude was well on his way to achieving his weight gain goal of 1600 pounds.

4-H is an international organization with branches in 50 countries encompassing 90,000 clubs.  Clubs exist across Canada and have been an integral part of rural youth leadership development. Their mission is “engaging youth to reach their fullest potential while advancing the field of youth development”

At the tradeshow and awards event held Tuesday, April 12 at Okanagan College, the winners of the Enterprize Challenge were announced. The competition started with 15 entrepreneurs pitching ideas to a panel of judges. Through the judging process, 7 did a final presentation, and on Tuesday the 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd place winners were announced.

“The judges had a very difficult job of deciding the winners – all of the finalists made excellent pitches,” said Leigha Horsfield with Community Futures.

Matt Parks with Parks Sustainable Design Build was awarded third prize for his business that offers design and construction of high performance, sustainable, and energy efficient new homes and renovations. Parks won a business services package worth over $5,200.

Second place went to Diane Kelm who developed an online directory for holistic practitioners. Healing Arts Finder is for practitioners who need affordable, targeted marketing and advertising services. Kelm took home a prize package valued at $8,500.

Top prize was given to Jaye Coward, owner of Farm Bound. Farm Bound connects people with organic and local food, offering customers throughout BC organic produce, artisan cheeses & meats, as well as organic, dried and processed goods.  Farm Bound has partnered with local farms and producers to provide and deliver specialty boxes each week. Customers subscribe to a box of their choice on a weekly, bi-weekly or monthly basis. Boxes are then delivered to customers’ homes or to pick-up locations. As the grand prize winner, Jaye received business capital and business services worth over $17,500.

The tradeshow highlighted all of the entrepreneurs who participated in the program as well as the sponsors and partners. “The business community has supported this program for that last two years and we are so grateful for the time, expertise and prizes they provide to this business development initiative,” said Horsfield.

The Community Futures Enterprize Challenge 2016 is presented by VantageOne Credit Union. Other partners and sponsors for this initiative include, KPMG, Nixon Wenger, Sproing Creative, The Morning Star, City of Vernon, Okanagan College, Greater Vernon Chamber of Commerce and Sun FM.

Community Futures and VantageOne Credit Union have selected the seven finalists for the Enterprize Challenge 2016. Not unlike CBC’s Dragons Den, the Enterprize Challenge is designed to give new startup business owners the chance to pitch their business idea to a panel of judges. Three of these finalists will share over $30,000 in Business Service Packages.

If you’re a budding entrepreneur or the owner of a new startup, and you think you can convince local business leaders you’ve got a big idea, what are you waiting for?

Register Today!

Community Futures Enterprize Challenge
is presented by VantageOne Credit Union

Thank you to the following sponsors:

VantageOne Credit Union, KPMG, Sproing Creative, The Morning Star, Nixon Wenger Lawyers, SUN FM, City of Vernon, Greater Vernon Chamber of Commerce, Okanagan College and Futurepreneur Canada