A ventilated backpack wins the Scottsdale Businessman – Scottsdale.org Award

Brice Sokolovski does not like to sweat when wearing a backpack.

“I just sweat a lot, no matter what I do,” said Sokolovski, owner of Vaucluse Gear LLC. “I found that I was not alone.”

Instead of grinning and wearing it, Sokolovski, two and a half years ago, started his business based on Scottsdale, mainly e -commerce business and started creating attachments for the backpack ventilation and related facilities to maintain the Community community by -Cool while their bags are towed.

“This is great: I get to keep my backpack and upgrade the ventilation system,” Sokolovski said. “This is really a match made in heaven.”

Judges of the SCORE 60th anniversary in Los Angeles seemed to agree. Sokolovski’s business won third place in the competition, which attracted over 2,200 small businesses.

Since 1964, the result has helped more than 17 million entrepreneurs start, grow or successfully get out of business. 10,000 SCORE volunteers provide free, expert mentoring, resources and education in all 50 US states and territories.

In the end, the competitors were arranged up to 60 contenders, who presented their live terrain before panels of judges of the five events, with three winners recognized each event.

Leading the competition, the participants were coupled with a mentor for results to help refine the terrain, strengthen their performance and improve their business plan.

Sokolovsky partnered with the mentor of the result Andrew Flipo, who helped him to pinch and strengthen the terrain in several versions.

“He is already managing a successful business,” Flipo said, adding that Sokolovski is “on the right path” to scales his business. “It is constantly repeated over the product. He is aware that there are always ways to improve it. “

While Sokolovski initially headed for the backpack community in his marketing, he has since expanded to focus on a broader audience.

“Every elderly human being was wearing a backpack at a time,” he told $ 100 million in the approximate market. “The goal is quite big. I have seen exponential growth with my sales. “

To get involved in his goal, Sokolovski uses his $ 5,000 award to launch Facebook ads, which he believes have the biggest return on investment, giving $ 15,000 or more sales.

He is in the process of obtaining a license at Arizona State University, which would allow him to sell his outfit at student stores.

Looking forward to the third year of the company, Sokolovski plans to focus on improving products and production on a much larger scale.

Sokolovski, who first contacted an assessment mentor decade ago while working as a non -profit fundraising consultant, credits the assessment to inform him through webinars aimed at business and really serves as a “network of interesting people with interesting ideas “.

Elected to participate in the field competition opened his eyes to “a completely different side of the result”. In his latest experience, SCORE provided the owners and entrepreneurs of the small business of Shark Tank.

Although he thought the likelihood of victory was “limited”, the basis of mentoring and the knowledge of the assessments were always more convenient.

“The likelihood of getting some really good tips or resources is extremely high,” he said. “They always rediscover or invent something new or provide some new type of information. You need to understand how the wheel of a business works. The result helps you work this effectively. “

Information: Score.org.