The story below is from our November/December 2023 issue. For more stories like it, Subscribe Today. Thank you!
Catch our podcast segment with Kathy Dean, Vice President of Business & Resource Development at The Advancement Foundation, to learn more about the organization and its Gauntlet program, a business competition providing resources and more to entrepreneurs in our region and even throughout the state of Virginia.
The Advancement Foundation’s Gauntlet competition helps develop and launch small businesses right here in the region.
Roanoke is known for its trails and the star that provides its nickname. But if you’re part of the Virginia business community, what may stand out the most about the Roanoke Valley is that it hosts the largest business development contest in the state, the Gauntlet.
Run by The Advancement Foundation (TAF) in Vinton, the Gauntlet is well known to locals through those who take home the top prize at the end of each session, such as 2022’s winner, Natalie Hodge of Rudy Girl Media. She began a film studio with resources for local creators in downtown Martinsville.
The GAUNTLET is Virginia’s largest business program and competition. Learn more about the program, resources, registration and more at theadvancementfoundation.org/the-gauntlet.
A year later, she’s launching a local TV network out of a former bakery and storage space.
The Gauntlet is undoubtedly a major launching pad for its big winners, but it’s a lot more than that. It’s a crash course in running a business that teaches you everything from creating a business plan to finding funding as you get started. It’s a community of entrepreneurs going through the same things.
And though you don’t need to participate in the final Shark Tank-like competition to take the course, everyone who does receives a prize to help them grow their business.
In a common refrain of Gauntlet alums, Hodge speaks fondly of what she learned from other participants, “creative, innovative people in our broader community who are making a go of this ... I think I learned almost as much from the other participants as I did those teaching the program.”
It’s part of what Annette Patterson, Executive Director of TAF and Gauntlet founder, calls “Stone Soup.” Business owners, sponsors, fellow participants, mentors and more contribute what they can, and the Gauntlet grows to nourish its students.
Another of Hodge’s favorite experiences? “Everyone who had a business related to food. There were some talented folks! I tasted some of the best treats!”
One of the contestants she’s likely referring to was Sabrina Ruth-Cooper of Bite Me Confections, who creates homemade marshmallow treats with creative flavors and playful names like “Slap Your Momma” and “Tickled Pink.”
A retired teacher, Ruth-Cooper began her business during a Franklin County salary freeze. The Gauntlet allowed her to transform her side hustle into a full-time job.
When someone tells her they don’t like marshmallows, she knows they’ve never had them homemade and are thinking of what you find in cocoa. “You should try them,” she says. “I think I can convert you.”
Anthony Giorgetti
Sebrina Ruth-Cooper of Bite Me Confections shows off her flavorful custom marshmallows.
That salesmanship and her experience speaking in front of the toughest crowd (elementary school students) made her pitch to the judges her favorite part of the Gauntlet. She opened with a surprising promise using her confection names:
“Pucker Up, Buttercup” because you’re about to taste something that will “Knock You Naked.”
She won $3,000 in cash and $7,000 in in-kind prizes.
While the most recent iterations of the Gauntlet have begun with classes of over a hundred entrepreneurs across multiple localities, its inaugural class in 2015 was a group of 14 students.
One of the participants from that first year was Dorothy Owsley of Transitional Options for Women.
Owsley was in the beginning phases of creating her nonprofit when Patterson encouraged her to enter the then-fledgling business development course she was beginning.
Transitional Options for Women’s mission is to make it easier for formerly incarcerated women to reintegrate into society. Her prize was a Chamber of Commerce membership, which allowed her to continue expanding her network.
Owsley went on to open a facility to house recent release-ees. Karin Shelor, one of her Gauntlet classmates, managed the home until it shut down in 2019, a casualty of COVID.
But even without a building, Transitional Options for Women continues helping formerly incarcerated women transition through career opportunities, clothing and their network of helpful people.
Dustin Smith graduated from the Gauntlet’s second class in 2016.
He was renting space for his new business, Discount Computer Services, from the Hive, TAF’s co-working space in Downtown Vinton. His company had grown from working out of his house to a booth in the Hive to a private office there.
But he wasn’t sure what came next. Smith was in his late 20s and was looking for structure.
Smith doesn’t remember where he placed and didn’t end up using all his prizes, but to him, that wasn’t the point. “I got what I needed out of it, which was a business plan structure.”
He still consults that business plan when making decisions, and he recently opened a second location in Salem.
In 2019, Teresa Lyons was concerned about FIT Learning’s viability when she joined the Gauntlet.
Her first two years in business had focused on learning FIT’s teaching methodology, and in 2019, it was time to grow her clientele. Lyons won a year at the Hive, which saved her money as she grew. Now, she rents space in Cave Spring and runs a thriving tutoring practice.
Lyons returned to the Gauntlet in 2021 to devise a plan for launching a nonprofit for students who couldn’t afford her services.
2021 was the first year that classes were all digital, and according to Annette Patterson, that was a game changer since they were running out of space for students in their physical locations. Online reduced the barrier to entry for participants who were already struggling to find time to run their business, often on top of full-time jobs or other responsibilities.
Of course, it was born of necessity in the middle of the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In fact, the 2020 cohort had to switch to online meetings midstream, forcing Patterson and the other staff to learn how to host online classes over a weekend before a Tuesday session! They also scrambled to host people in communities with less-than-desirable internet access.
By 2021, everyone was used to online meetings, so the resistance and learning curve were lower.
While Lyons learned a lot in both sessions, she enjoyed the first year more, “The reason I loved it the first time was the richness of getting face-to-face time.”
Another 2021 alum, Cindy Forbes of Fyvie Farms (an event venue she and her husband renovated from a dilapidated country club), also faced issues when her internet would not allow her to use video and audio concurrently during meetings.
J&C Photography
Cindy Forbes turned an old country club into Fyvie Farms, an event venue now hosting beautiful weddings.
She “didn’t have that connection with other people to see if they were struggling with the same things,” but she learned a lot from the content and took home, to her great surprise, an excellent prize package.
On the night of the awards ceremony, her booth was in a back room and so far from the rest that someone told her, “They put the losers back here.” As the night continued and her name wasn’t called, Forbes thought they’d forgotten about her. Turns out she came in second!
She used her prizes to create some mock events, including a faux wedding, which put her venue on the map after a viral TikTok. Now, Fyvie Farms’ schedule is always packed.
Forbes has recommended the Gauntlet to several people, including some who are now graduates. By 2022, participants like Hodge and Ruth-Cooper could take advantage of nonmandatory, in-person meetings, hence Hodge’s earlier praising of the goodies she couldn’t have enjoyed over her internet connection.
The most recent Gauntlet alumnae graduated in 2023 and included April Jones and Sarah Bidwell. Though they only wrapped a few months ago, both have taken off running.
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Sarah Bidwell runs a mobile legal service, Wills on Wheels.
Bidwell is working full-time, offering mobile legal service with Wills on Wheels. The Gauntlet taught her that “starting (her) business and growing (her) business was absolutely possible,” and her business plan helped her articulate her value proposition of convenience, ease and friendliness to her audience.
Jones recently transitioned out of her full-time job as Life Care Coordinators began taking on clients. Her work ranges from finding medical specialists to acquiring lawn care for her clients as they age.
The Gauntlet encouraged her to get where she is. “It’s grueling… it’s taking people out of their comfort zone,” but she looked forward to Tuesday nights for “get(ting) my mind back on to my business plan and staying on track.”
Both businesses fill niches of people who often slip through existing systems’ cracks. That aligns with the Gauntlet’s mission.
Annette Patterson says, “Sometimes people don’t even realize that they’re innovators,” and the contestants’ businesses “could be a complete disruptor!”
This coming year, as the Gauntlet celebrates its tenth anniversary, it will undergo its biggest change since switching to online in 2020 – the introduction of tracks.
While “everyone is welcome,” they’re organizing 2024 contestants into similar groups, including Main Street, outdoor recreation, home-based businesses and early-stage high-growth.
This is only the newest innovation the Gauntlet is using to better serve its students, whose success is also Roanoke’s.
The story above is from our November/December 2023 issue. For more stories like it, Subscribe Today. Thank you!