Peer 151 Tour

Mr. Chris Oswald, Executive Director & Mr. Kurt Artinger, Owner
Friend of CEO

On Monday, the class visited Peer 151. The executive director, Chris Oswald, and the owner, Kurt Artinger, taught the students about the purpose of the company: to help develop entrepreneurial opportunities. The duo also explained that failure should not impact the student’s businesses. “Perseverance and confidence will go a long way in business” was their lasting advice. Thank you Chris Oswald and Kurt Artinger for taking time to speak to our class! 

Written by Sandy Amorado & Edited by Jessica Stern

FKG Oil Tour

Mr. Todd Badgley, President
FKG Oil – Investor

To finish up the week, the class visited Todd Badgley at FKG Oil. Mr. Badgley created an engaging presentation for the students: he began with an introductory session and then went into the nuts and bolts of FKG Oil/Moto Mart. He explained some of the more personal aspects of business such as leadership, the workplace, and coming up with ideas. Marketing and money were also hot topics Mr. Badgley hit on before challenging the class to a game of Jeopardy. The exciting session was just the boost the students needed! Thank you Todd Badgley!

 Written by Jessica Stern & Edited by Aliyah Gillespie

KMOV News

On Thursday during the 5 o’clock news, the students gathered excitedly around their televisions to see KMOV’s special of the class. The segment featured both footage of the class and interviews from students Heather Gosebrink & Malik Marks-McRath, investor Mrs. Renae Eichholz and facilitator Mrs. Julie Siebers. The two minute video can be viewed on KMOV’s website at http://www.kmov.com/clip/11998155/news-4-schools-learning-to-entrepreneurs.

Written by Jessica Stern

Just a Reminder

Our door is always open. Entrepreneurs, visitors, guests, and friends are welcome and highly encouraged to join us. Drop in and share your story with our students or participate in our class discussions. Check out the schedule on the website.

If you are interested in hosting our students for an educational visit about your business operations or would like to speak to the class and share your story, please email the facilitator, Julie Siebers, at jsiebers@bths201.org or call or text her at 618.719.3177.

Journal Tidbits

This week we are able to see the businesses of Peer 151 and FKG Oil Company.  At Peer 151, we are able to listen to the executive director Chris Oswald and the owner Kurt Artinger.  These two men were very passionate about what they do.  Oswald came from a missionary background.  So, he knew the way of service pretty well.  Artinger was the one that surprised me.  He had all these different skills such as jewelry technique.  It was nice hearing about background.  At FGK Oil, Todd Badgley was fun to listening to and how he run his business.  I did not realize how much the company actually owns.  Boundaries are endless, I guess.  I loved how at the end we were able to play jeopardy as a class.  Each business, though, reiterated that passion, good connections, and morals will drive your company.  I think it is now just sticking inside my mind.

As a entrepreneur, I have to believe that anything is possible.  Opportunities are out there.  I have to be willing to grab them.  I need to take that leap of faith.  Risk it to get the biscuit, as people would say.  My creativity can go long way.  Logic will be important.  I will have to learn to stay more focus on my goals and diverge.  My determination will be seen through my hard work.  The idea of learning will never stop.  There is more out there then what is on the surface.  So, I have to find it.  It is out there waiting for me.  Failure...pfft...I say try again until I succeed.  Success will happen for me one day.  I will be living the life I love.  As of right now, my journey is just starting to take flight.  I just need to sit back and enjoy the ride and see where it takes me.

Written by Sandy Amorado

When I was in kindergarten, one day the teacher told us we were going to make robots. I was so excited and thought that we would literally be making robots that could do your homework, tuck you in, and be your friend or whatever it was that kindergarteners want a robot for. But it was really just a craft: we glued aluminum foil onto a paper, decorated it, and wrote what our robots do. Throughout my entire school, there have been so many 'hands on activities' meant to teach something, like a simulation. And I usually got lost when trying to keep up with our 'background knowledge' so I could properly pretend in the story and 'play the part'. We were on guidelines, nothing unexpected would happen, the story would play out, we would write a paper on it, and afterwards it would just be another day at school.

This just shows the radical difference between CEO and other classes. There is no outline, who knows maybe our class business will fail miserably. But we’ll still learn something out of it. Anything could happen. We are the story. I underestimated this the other day when my sister saw some text messages about our class business location. She asked me "why does it matter? Isn’t this just a scenario so you kind of get an idea of how these things work?"

This just reminded me that CEO is REAL. The goal of $10,000 is real, and so is the money we will make, and the debt and payments accrued. The event we're hosting to make it is real. Every step of the process is completely, 100%, ‘real’. The businesses we carry on are real, actual jobs that we can make money from and keep. School just doesn’t work like that. You learn from a textbook, a lecture, or a ‘scenario’. It’s really… just mind boggling that high schoolers can get this kind of experience.

Written by Jessica Stern

Peer 151 was a different type of business than we have seen this year so far. Instead of providing a product or service the customers basically pay to work with other people. Of course there were office spaces for rent, but most of it was for the entrepreneurs that want a place to bounce ideas back and forth off of other people for opinions. I was intrigued on how they formed an old YMCA into the office spaces they have now. We learned about how some other businesses have remodeled and renovated older buildings in order to save money. I found it very fascinating that the city was going to tear down this location until they bought it for a dollar. I had no idea that tearing a building down costs so much money. Some quotes I took from this visit were:

• “Can fix the old, but need new”
• “Collaborative innovation”
• “If you put in the time or energy you will be a good entrepreneur”
• “Being somewhere where work is international is important”

I loved how Kurt and Chris said they would rather live a life where they trust people until they prove them otherwise. I agree with this statement because if you never trust anyone you will not be happy.

I really liked FKG oil and what Todd Badgley had to say about their company. Their companies cover six states and have seventy nine stores. I thought it was interesting that they have a variety of companies: Moto, Gia’s Pizza, Ryka, Orange Leaf, Subway. They don’t really go together, but all are well known. I had no idea that merchant fees(credit card fees) are so costly to have. Todd said in the powerpoint that they lead by example. This is through: respect, never belittling anyone, and show confidence. “People like to see that competitive spirit” I agree that people think competition is fun and makes it more exciting. With businesses and competitors if you don’t have the competitiveness do better than them your company will not succeed. I really liked the quote, “Don’t be afraid to ask questions.” I think that people can never stop learning. One of the biggest ways to learn is to ask questions and learn by curiousness. If you sk questions, people think you are genuinely interested in what they’re saying and be more open in sharing.

I am really liking the CEO program and what it is offering me. I love that I get to learn about all different things every single day. Our class business is a different type of project than I have ever done before. I am learning new skills each and every day. I can’t wait to see what the rest of the year has to offer.

Written by Heather Gosebrink

We began the week at the beautiful Peer 151. This is a unique type of business with the purpose of providing office space for people who prefer not to work at home. The building was once the YMCA and has since been reinvented to a colorful, co working facility. The owners, Curt and Chris, were very charismatic and provided lots of great quotes and advice. One quote from Curt that stood out to me was, "Don't be afraid of failure." He then went on to explain that failure is simply a way that did not work. Failure is a deterrent to a lot of things I wish to do one day. I believe in dreaming big. They say sky is the but why stop there? As if there isn't an entire galaxy above. This slightly frightens me at times because of my chronic self doubt. I have so many ideas and dreams that I've never spoken of for the simple fact that I believe they seem impossible. What I've learned so far from the speakers at CEO is that the possibilities are endless. You never know where you are going to end up but you can't be afraid to take risks and even fail sometimes. I am beginning to believe in my ideas more and more as time progresses. I have a lot of great ideas for my individual business and will began to get it in full gear very very soon!

Chris brought up a great point about laying down a strong structure for your business. In the past, he did lots of work in Africa. He had an organization dedicated to connecting orphanages in small areas in Africa to places in the USA to help support them. It was a very successful 501c until Chris got into other things. The organization started to go down because he was the business. He regreted being so mission driven. There was not a structure lied down for the organization to go on without him. Too many times have I tried to do every job of a task by myself. You must disperse the work so things can go on when you are not there. I also enjoyed hearing the ideas Chris talked about that came out of Peer 151. When people gather together in a space like that, brilliant ideas come about which I feel ties into the students of CEO. There are so many ideas that come about from the students. There might be clash often but everyone has collaborated with each other on an idea one way or another. I really enjoyed Peer 151.

 Written by Melony Allen

Peer 151 was cool place. I didn't know there were other places out there like that. The color scheme was my favorite part of the building. He said that helped promote innovation and creative thinking. Coincidentally I started thinking about my personal business product and how I want to design it! I liked how they added the dance floor because of an obstacle they faced so instead of giving up, they made something good come from it. His advice about not freaking out about the name and logo stuck with me. The name came from their address which I thought was really cool. Although branding and marketing is important, I agree it shouldn't be a big stressor in your life. I really liked the amount of time we spent on talking about failing. At first when I think it was Chris who said it, told Melony that maybe she shouldn't be an entrepreneur if she was afraid to fail, I got a little offended because I'm also afraid to fail and I'm sure the majority of the class felt the same way. But then I realized that it was true. In school we are so conditioned to make the best grades and excel in everything we do. In the real world and especially the business world, it's okay to fail. That's a part of life and learning from your mistakes.

Written by Aliyah Gillespie