Every year during the last week in August, the Frederick Chamber of Commerce sponsors S.H.E. Week, a week-long series of events to celebrate strength, heart and equality. For the first time the festivities included a business pitch competition called S.H.E. Pitch – and MWBC was one of the sponsors. The SHE Pitch business competition was held at the Hodson Auditorium at Hood College and hosted local woman owned businesses going to the mound to pitch for cash prizes, in front of an audience of over 100 people in a live-streamed event covered by local media. While the pressure was on the six finalists, they had their families there for support and utilized the training they received from MWBC’s business counselor Karen Kalantzis. Emcee Helen Propheter, Executive Director of Frederick County Office of Economic Development, kept the audience entertained with quizzes for the audience and even did a push up on the stage! | ||
After a tough meeting by the judges, the winners were announced. For the idea stage, the winner was Kara Kelley of Ifey and Blues bakery. She won $4500 and will be purchasing professional bakery equipment with her earnings. For the growth stage, the winner was Allison Jachowski of Odin Cross Fit gym, who won $5000 and will be using the money to build out a new location in downtown Frederick. During the break, the audience could vote for a People’s Choice Award. Since practically every member of Odin Cross Fit was in the audience, they easily also won the additional prize of $500.
We hope to continue sponsoring the SHE Pitch competition again in 2022. |