Many thanks to Stanford’s Northgate for hosting the Seattle Restaurant Alliance November meeting.
We were happy to be joined by Oliver Kotelnikov and Sally Bergesen from our monthly sponsor IBA, who shared about the services they offer.
Here are a few resources and highlights from the presentation:
- IBA is the oldest business brokerage firm in the Pacific Northwest and offers small to midsize businesses exit planning strategies and business evaluation services.
- Services offered by IBA include market evaluations, marketing, buyer screenings and more, all while upholding confidentiality.
- Please contact Oliver Kotelnikov at oliver@ibainc.com and Sally Bergesen at sally@ibainc.com for questions about consulting IBA for your business.
We had an informative presentation from Melissa Holtzclaw and Brenda Rice from Parker, Smith and Feek who shared resources for what to do in the case of an active assailant.
Here are a few resources and highlights from the presentation:
- The most important thing to prepare your business for the possibility of an active assailant is to equip staff with training and knowledge for possible scenarios.
- Violence can come from many different sources, so it is important to not ignore suspicious behaviors from any person.
- You can be prepared for an active assailant in many other ways like being aware of your surroundings.
- If you have any questions or would like access to more resources from the presentation, contact Melissa Holtzclaw at mlholtzclaw@psfinc.com and Brenda Rice at rice@imacorp.com.
Efrem Fesaha, Board member for the SRA, led a conversation on his experience with growing Boon Boona Coffee from one location to multiple.
Here are a few highlights from the conversation:
- To Efrem, the hardest part of expanding his business was learning to balance his focus between both locations and stocking both inventories.
- Efrem worked with the Ascend program at the University of Washington which helps small businesses analyze their business model. Through those connections he was able to open another shop in the University District Bookstore.
- Thank you to Efrem for sharing his experiences with us. We look forward to continuing discussions of business growth in the coming year!
Next SRA Meeting:
The next meeting will be in January (Date and Location TBD).