It’s that time of year again, the time to gear up for this year’s HIplan Business Plan Competition. The competition is in its third year and offers a prize of $25,000 to the contestant with the winning business plan and $5,000 in radio advertising to the runner-up. There is also an award of two semesters of free tuition at either the University of Hawaii at Hilo or Hawaii Community College for the highest-ranking individual student or student team entry of up to four participants.
In each of its two preceding years, the competition has attracted almost 50 applicants, and this year “we would love to see closer to 75,” according to Jason Ueki, HIplan’s Executive Director.
“What we’re trying to do with the competition is to educate the entrepreneurial community to increase its access to funding,” Ueki said. “We know that commercial banks are rejecting at least 50 percent of their business loan applicants, and mostly that’s because the applicants’ business planning is just not up to par. There is a continuing need for business plan writing education so that owners can get their message across both in writing and in presentation. Our incentive for promoting these efforts is the $25,000 prize.”
Last year’s competition was centered in West Hawaii and saw entrants from just about every kind of company you can imagine: from companies specializing in everything from ocean energy to mushroom cultivation, from chocolate production to early childhood education, and from barbecue wood chips to medicine. The contestants pretty much spanned the waterfront of entrepreneurial innovation on Hawaii Island and uniformly dazzled the panel and the audience attending the semifinals and the finals with the range of their creativity. The winner last year was Sunshine Pediatric Clinic, a Hilo based practice run by Dr. Shallon and Daniel Craddock.
This year HIplan is following its pattern of alternating West Hawaii and East Hawaii locales, and in 2018 HIplan events will be held in East Hawaii, but just like last year, all Big Island entrepreneurs are encouraged to apply. The application fee is $100.
The other big change that is not quite here this year, but is in process, is HIplan’s transition from being organized under the Hawaii Island Chamber of Commerce to a stand-alone non-profit organization that would open it up to wider funding opportunities. “When that happens, it will allow us to apply for foundation funding, so we can generate a larger pool of funds for prizes,” said Ueki.
In preparation for the HIplan competition, the West Hawaii Small Business Development Center is offering a workshop on “How to Write a Business Plan” on Wednedsay. Registration starts at 8:30 a.m., and the class runs from 9-11:30 a.m. with a $20 registration fee (www.hisbdc.org). The workshop will be held at Hale Iako, 73-970 Makako Bay Dr., on the NELHA campus. SBDC advisors in both Kona and Hilo are available to assist contestants with their business plans at any time prior to the competition’s submission deadline of Sept. 8.
Competition entrants will be whittled down to 15 semifinalists based on their written business plans. On Sept. 22, these finalists and the public are invited to a “Pitch” presentation by Robbie Melton, executive director of the HI Technology Development Corporation, who will offer tips to contestants on how to refine their “pitches,” the verbal presentations they will need to make to investors.
That is followed by the semifinals on Oct. 6 where the contestants will deliver 12-minute presentations on their companies to a panel of business experts.
Eight finalists will be selected from that group and will participate in the finals on Oct. 27 for a repeat of their presentations and a two-minute “elevator speech” to another panel of experts. The winner will be selected that day, to general acclamation from the audience and the groans of the runner up’s.
The competition is not only entertaining to the audience, it’s also a valuable learning experience for the applicants. Pretty much uniformly, all the contestants in the competition last year had nothing but good things to say about the experience of participating in the competition.
“It’s been an honor to rise in the competition,” said Noa Eads, one of last year’s semifinalists. “I felt blessed to be among all these innovative businesses. Even though we were working on our own projects, there was a sense of collaboration and it’s been a lot of fun.”
“Sometimes as an entrepreneur, you feel alone in the wilderness, that business isn’t as important here in Hawaii as elsewhere, and that can be difficult and isolating”, said David Real, another 2017 semifinalist. “I don’t feel that way anymore. I feel supported. An experience like this really gives your morale a boost. That’s important, as is the inspiration that comes from making connections with people who have started something from nothing.”
Dennis Boyd is the director of the West Hawaii Small Business Development Center