Entrepreneurs + Innovators
As Parma small businesses began to suffer in the pandemic, Polish Village Parma stepped in this summer to organize a COVID-19 cash mob—offering raffle tickets for every $10 spent in neighborhood stores.
The Cleveland Leadership Center in September will honor six innovators during the Spark 2020: Grit to Great leadership symposium. These six people accomplish amazing feats while often going unnoticed.
When the coronavirus brought everyday life to a screeching halt and area hospitals worried they would run out of PPE, several Northeast Ohio manufacturers and other businesses stepped up to adapt their processes, save jobs, and make what was needed.
In an effort to find a healthy snack for her three children, Amy Witzigreuter mastered the art of making a tasty, easy-to-digest granola. Two years after launching Witzi's Raw Granola, customers throughout Ohio can't stop eating the five varieties she cranks out of her St. Clair Superior neighborhood kitchen.
Small businesses in Gordon Square, like Superelectric Pinball Parlor and Maelstrom Collaborative Arts, are adapting their models during the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks to money from Detroit Shoreway Community Development Organization's Fast Forward Fund.
Exponential growth in the middle of a pandemic? Taking a new Ohio City beer garden from concept to completion in the span of three weeks? These may seem like Herculean feats, but Saucy Brew Works seems to have found the secret sauce for success.
When local day camps began cancelling sessions this summer, one young entrepreneur took it upon herself to bring camp to the kids in her Cleveland Heights neighborhood with Kamp Kate.
After a year of delighting a growing customer base with its vegan comfort food, Squash the Beef is raising funds to buy a food trailer and take their catering business to the streets of Cleveland.
Fahrenheit chef/owner Rocco Whalen feels the pain Cleveland has felt during the coronavirus, the murder of George Floyd, and the riots. But now, he looks to the future and hopes for better days in Cleveland and in the local restaurant industry.
Chef Doug Katz has launched Chim,a ghost kitchen that serves South American fare for takeout and delivery.
Thanks to a $56,000 Cleveland Foundation COVID-19 grant the Detroit Shoreway Community Development Corporation is paying six local eateries to cook free meals for those who need them—helping both residents and small business owners.
Appropriately sized at 216 pages, the new book Boss Ladies of CLE highlights some of our city's top female talent.
Anna Harouvis, raw food chef and owner of Anna in the Raw on E. 9th Street, shares her story of weathering the coronavirus and her hopes for the future.
May typically signals the start of wedding season, but in the face of COVID-19, the forecast looks a whole lot different this year. Enter the pop-up wedding option at Cuyahoga Valley National Park, an intimate gathering for 10 people or less that highlights Ohio's only national park as its backdrop.
Even though Ohio's stay-at-home order is lifted, suburban small business owners struggle with the pros and cons of re-opening and keeping their customers safe.
If Etsy and the Yellow Pages had a baby, it might look like Made Cleveland. Set to launch this Saturday, May 23, Made Cleveland is an online e-commerce hub and directory featuring local artists and makers — and is ready to fill in the gaps and meet demand in the absence of in-person markets this season.
With offices shutting down during the COVID-19 pandemic, Lunch Owl owner Scott Himmel create a new business, Kudo Box, to honor employees working from home with locally-made goodies.
CycleBar in Beachwood is one of the first fitness centers in Northeast Ohio to install a state-of-the-art hydroperoxide air purifying system—making owner Joe Purton confident his members will be safe when he re-opens in June.
The Fiarmount owner Jake Ororsz has used the restaurant shutdown order to hone his takeout operations and tweak the food and drink menus in anticipation of reopening. Now, Orosz says he's ready to take on any battle in the war on the coronavirus.
Bridget Thibeault, owner of Luna Bakery and Cafe, shares her story of building her business over the past 10 years and the anxieties of making it through the COVID-19 pandemic.