Getting up in front of a room full of peo­ple and shar­ing a new busi­ness idea is not always the eas­i­est thing to do.

Seven groups of stu­dents as well as three com­mu­nity mem­bers did so at the Innovation Unleashed event on April 11. The idea of the event was to encour­age stu­dent entre­pre­neurs to reach out and bring their busi­ness ideas to life.

Each team had five min­utes to pro­pose a busi­ness idea, and it was then rated by a panel of judges and the audience.

“I was really ner­vous, but once I got the micro­phone in my hand and started to present I felt com­fort­able. The fact we added com­edy to our pre­sen­ta­tion made it a lot more fun,” Brandon Archambault, an FSU senior in cor­po­rate fit­ness, said.

Each team had a dif­fer­ent approach to win­ning over the judges and audi­ence votes. Some groups attempted to place by using humor and oth­ers by pro­fes­sion­al­ism. Even so, each team pre­sented facts and research about a cer­tain topic that one day they hope can be made into a business.

“I got a lot of entre­pre­neur­ial spirit out of this event. After par­tic­i­pat­ing in it, I find myself think­ing of new inno­v­a­tive busi­ness ideas,” Archambault said. “Ultimately, I plan on being an entre­pre­neur and I believe events like Innovation Unleashed are my inspiration.”

Archambault and his part­ner Kyle Czuprenski pitched an idea called “Drunkables: Lunch for Hangovers.” They tied for audi­ence favorite with Evan Pazowski and Parker Hammon, who pitched an idea for an online con­cert creator.

Each group was awarded $250 for their cre­ative busi­ness pitches.

The grand prize win­ners of the stu­dent show­case judge’s choice were Kristen Dzikowic and Andrew MacIver. The two seniors pitched an idea about a human resource web­site and were awarded $500.

Taking sec­ond place by judge’s vote and the award of $250 was Elizabeth Fabode. Her busi­ness pitch con­sisted of a com­pany that would work to cater to col­lege students.

“The event was a great suc­cess,” Archambault said. “We had some great ideas pitched and a large audience.”

The judges con­sisted of Ron Steiner, Michigan State University Extension Entrepreneurship Development Educator and founder of The Kitchen Incubator; Bonnie Knopf, pres­i­dent of Intrepid Plastics, Ferris alumna and found­ing mem­ber of the Grand Rapids Inventors Network; and Kevin Kinnally, vice president/general man­ager of Kraftube Inc. and local entrepreneur.

The money awarded to com­peti­tors was raised from con­tri­bu­tions from more than 20 local busi­ness owners.

Some of the busi­nesses include Chemical Bank, Schuberg Insurance Agency, Kraftube, JW Speaker, Intrepid Plastics, Michigan Works West Central, ABC Auto, Simply Speaking and Applied Imaging. Several more busi­nesses donated prod­ucts and gift cer­tifi­cates for audi­ence door prizes. n