SHOW NOTES

INTRODUCING GARRETT  VENABLE!

Garrett Venable is an aspiring entrepreneur.  He and his brother have started their own mowing and landscaping business in Greensboro, North Carolina.  Garrett has great knowledge of his customer base as well as where he wants his business to go.  He does a lot to market his business already, and he is not afraid to use “rubber sole marketing.”  What I mean by this is that he beats the street, wearing out his shoe rubber, hanging fliers and finding customers.  His business is growing, and he is getting busier.

If running his own business was not enough Garrett is playing high school football.  He plays both offense and defense.  Any of you who played football in high school know that practice starts in August, and they are intense.  Well, August is prime lawn mowing and landscaping season.  So is September and October.  So, Garrett keeps himself very busy.

What I like about Garrett’s story is that it reminds me of a childhood experience.  However, he is successful and I was not.  When I was about 14 years old my dad decided I needed to get to work.  He helped me make up flyers for lawn mowing, and he sent me out into a neighborhood to start trying to get work mowing lawns.  I didn’t get one job, probably because I really did not want to at that point.  But Garrett has done this and is thriving.  Looking back now, I wish I had the entrepreneurship bug back then, but I did not.  So, I appreciate even more what Garrett has been able to do.

SUPERVISED AGRICULTURAL EXPERIENCE:

Venable Brothers Lawn Care Service – Mowing and Landscaping

HIGH SCHOOL:

Southern Guilford High School, Greensboro, North Carolina

MASCOT:

The Storm

FFA ADVISOR:

Brad Hensley

CONTACT INFORMATION FOR GARRETT VENABLE:

Click on the picture below to be taken to the Southern Guilford High School Ag. Department’s website:

Garrett’s FFA Advisor’s Email Address: hensleb@gcsnc.com

Southern Guilford High School Telephone Number: 336-674-4250

FFA LINKS:

National FFA Organization

Supervised Agricultural Experiences (SAE’s)

Support FFA 

Donate to FFA – One way that FFA students are able to start small businesses is through an FFA grant of $1,000.  In 2014, 141 FFA students received these grants.  With your donations, more students can get this head start – pay it forward.

REASONS TO DONATE TO FFA:

• Only 2% of Americans grow and raise most of the food and livestock consumed by the other 98% as well as the rest of the world.  FFA is providing the needed education, training and resources to Americans that will carry that torch forward and insure that America continues to have inexpensive, quality food.
• Rural Communities will rely on entrepreneurship in the future for population growth and job creation.  The FFA is a major catalyst to that entrepreneurial growth.
• Farmers, ranchers and those working in agriculture give the rest of America incredible amounts of freedom because the search for food is as simple as going to the grocery store:

“Because American farmers are able to provide for so many of us, they give more and more of us the freedom to pursue goals and livelihoods beyond growing the food we need to survive.”

U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack 

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