Business Planning Leads to Smooth Operations for Augusta Coffee Roaster

Bunoa Caffe: UGA Small Business Development Center

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Newspaper veterans John and Pat Curry love a good cup of coffee. So when they ran across a book on home coffee roasting several years ago, they purchased it and a small home roaster. Soon, John was spending Saturday afternoons roasting on their front porch in Athens. In 2009, John and Pat were laid off […]

Finding the Right Ingredients

Doug Turbush

Chef Doug Turbush has garnered more than 15 years of experience and rave reviews in the restaurant industry. But the kitchen wasn’t his end goal when he began earning a degree in hotel management. “I’d been working in restaurants since I was 15, and there was no order or discipline. It was complete chaos,” he […]

Versatile Mold and Design

Strategic Planning Expands Markets for Rutledge Mold and Tooling Manufacturer Inventiveness and responsiveness have long been trademarks of the Heusser family business, Versatile Mold and Design. But like many small businesses, this Rutledge mold and tooling manufacturer’s management – led by siblings Bob, Tim, Frank and Suzanne Brown – was so busy working in the […]

Dreaming Cow

Dreaming Cow - UGA SBDC

Expansion Financing Essential for Rapidly Growing Thomasville Producer Kyle and Janelle Wehner started Dreaming Cow in 2009 to test whether their yogurt concept could be built into a national brand. Using an all-natural recipe derived from the South Island of Janelle’s native New Zealand, they make Dreaming Cow yogurt on Kyle’s parents’ Thomasville farm. Kyle […]

The Grass is Always Greener

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Atlas Turf International owner John Holmes figuratively fell into his job selling turf grasses in foreign countries. He worked at Highland Country Club in LaGrange when he was 15, deciding he wanted to be a golf course superintendent. John graduated from Lake City Community College with a degree in turf grass management and began work in […]

Market and Banking Advice Aid Dairy Expansion into Agri-Tourism Destination

It is rare to see a young family in Georgia make a business out of a small dairy farm. The around-the-clock work and competition from big corporate dairies has stopped many who desire such a lifestyle dead in their tracks. Not so for fourth-generation dairy farmer Scott Glover and his wife, Jennifer, who have built […]

Janie Davis, Children Unique Christian Daycare Center, Inc.

Janie Davis

Growing Pains Send Augusta Day Care Operator to the SBDC Shortly after opening a licensed childcare service in her home, Janie Davis needed to expand. “We started in 1996 with six children in my home, but received so many calls that we knew we had to grow,” say Davis, founder and CEO of Children Unique Christian Daycare Center, Inc., in […]