Student entrepreneurs from Georgia Southern University will be showcasing and selling their products to the public in the first Market on Main festival, also billed as Statesboro’s Student Makers Market, 6 p.m.-9:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 27, on East Main Street.
Georgia Southern’s entrepreneurship club, Square One, is hosting Market on Main in cooperation with the Downtown Statesboro Development Authority.
Square One Entrepreneurship Club has invited about 45 student vendors and is helping them to interact with the community and gain further experience of what it means to be an entrepreneur, said the club’s President Benjamin Youngstrom, a GS senior majoring in business management and entrepreneurship.
“We’ve got quite a wide variety of student businesses coming out,” he said. “We’ve got a couple of small beauty companies that are making their own products. We’ve got some artists. There’s a good chance that we’ll have someone out there who does custom motorcycle work and who might even bring out a motorcycle to the event.”
This inaugural Square One Market on Main, based in the area of East Main from City Hall and the university’s City Center down to the Eagle Creek Brewing Company, will also feature live musical performances by a local band, Rosatoi, and musician Robert Cottle. Food trucks from vendors such as Rolling Monkey, Saucy Shrimp, Three Tree Coffee Roasters and Wavee Shavee are scheduled to be there, along with some activities for children.
It is also advertised as a “pet friendly” event, with pets welcomed.
Youngstrom, 23, from Roswell, Georgia, while still on his way toward graduating with a Bachelor of Business Administration, owns his second start-up business, Mercury Mobile Printers. He sold his first startup, Check-Out, two or three years ago.
Other leading organizers of the Market on Main event are Square One Entrepreneurship Club’s Vice President Emma Tirlot and member Brianna Allen. Owner of startup business Zen’Ergy, Allen was one of the student entrepreneurs who suggested holding such a festival.
The club only recently renewed its status as a student organization on campus and as of Thursday had just five official members, Youngstrom said. But he hopes to sign up those other 40 or so student entrepreneurs and reach out to other potential members.
The club hosts an activity called Faux Pitch where students pitch “kind of out there, funny” business ideas on alternate Tuesday nights at Eagle Creek.
Additionally, the club leadership has plans to expand on a previous three-day weekend event where students pitched ideas for real business startups. The expanded program may last two or three weeks during which the student entrepreneurs can receive information and feedback from experienced business founders and experts and leave with a business plan, Youngstrom said.
East Main Street is scheduled to be closed to motor vehicle traffic beginning at 4 p.m. Friday to allow for setup of the festival and to remain closed until 9:30 p.m.