Meet the Winners
Spring 2023
Arnesia Calk
Benignity LLC
Arnesia Calk is a Credentialed Professional Gerontologist and a Certified Alzheimers Disease and Dementia Care Trainer who has worked in geriatrics for 4 years.
Benignity LLC provides consultation services, professional dementia training for all who work in gerontology, educational seminars, and traveling notary services in the geriatric community.
DeNae Howard
NaeAna’s Gourmet Cookies
NaeAna’s specializes in gourmet cookies and family experiences. Introducing a spin to traditional cookies, NaeAna’s offers homemade recipes and a family love touch to cookies.
NaeAna’s Gourmet Cookies is a startup run by two sisters DeNae and De’Ana Howard. We operate as a subsidiary of our family’s restaurant Gobble Stop Smokehouse.
Emma Puls
Sort & Support LLC
Emma Puls is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who specializes in helping individuals and families achieve their goals through hands-on support and skill building.
Sort & Support offers home organization services to folks whose mental health symptoms are impacting their ability to get and/or stay organized.
Firaol Ahmed
Moii Coffee
Moii Coffee is a socially conscious roasting company, dedicated to improving the lives of Ethiopian farmers through specialty coffee.
Kelly Adams
Watering And Advancing Youth
I'm a wife, and a passionate mom of five with a heart to serve my community. I was inspired to start The W.A.Y. Center and build a service-oriented team, to deliver a solution to the educational and health disparities facing our community.
The W.A.Y. Center will serve as an intentional out-of-school time solution serving K-5 youth in the St. Louis community; watering and advancing youth to achieve academic and total health success.
Kianna & Paris Grimmett
First Generation NFP
Paris (B.S., M.B.A., M.A.T) and Kianna Grimmett (B.S.) are the co-founders of First Generation NFP. Paris was born and raised in East Saint Louis, Illinois. Kianna spent most of her life in Wellston, Missouri. Kianna and Paris currently reside in East Saint Louis. Their life experiences shaped their paradigms, making them uniquely qualified to serve the youth in East Saint Louis.
Krescant Sims-Wooten
Krescant Marie LLC
Sims-Wooten is the owner/founder of Krescant Marie. She oversees day-to-day operations to serve our customers and their athleisure needs. Krescant holds an MBA from
Syracuse.
Krescant Marie is a black woman owned athleisure based brand focused on motivating women of all shapes and sizes through fitness, fashion, functionality, and inclusivity.
Samuel HOU
Baocart
Samuel Hou is a Lindenwood University alumnus and the son of 2 Chinese immigrants. His passion is highlighting Asian culture and connecting people to it through food.
Baocart.com is an online delivery service for Asian groceries in St. Louis. It has the largest selection of Asian cooking essentials, with fast delivery and all in one single website.
Shunetta Daugherty
The Social Butterfly Party Bar
Shunetta Daugherty- Holds a Master’s in Teaching degree from Lindenwood University and is a talented and gifted education and STEM specialist in the School District of University City. A native of St. Louis, MO who enjoyed spending childhood summers in her family home in Oxford, MS. The Social Butterfly Party Bar was established in 2022 and is ran by Shunetta and her sister Nikisha, a licensed practical nurse in St. Louis,
MO.
The Social Butterfly Party Bar is a unique mobile party bar that we converted from a utility trailer into a classy mobile bar on wheels. We specialize in bringing the party to you! Whether it is a private party, public, corporate, wedding, birthday event, we will provide services that include alcoholic beverages to create a memorable, mobile, whole bar party experience to fit our client’s needs.
Souzan Gerami
TeaVoila
I am Souzan, the founder of TeaVoila. The journey that led me to launch TeaVoila began 20 years ago when I first moved to the US. I have always loved tea. TeaVoila was an idea born purely out of the love my friends and I had for tea.
The most convenient way to take high quality tea on the go while you are helping the environment. With the sealing technology you can refill the cups 3 times with no bitter aftertaste.