Students, alumni leaders in the Baltimore business community, and College trustees swapped stories over breakfast Sept. 28 at the Mercantile-Safe Deposit and Trust in Baltimore.

“Having the confidence to start a business is tough. It’s the biggest challenge,” Rick Barnes ’77, a partner in the law firm Goodell, Devries, Leech and Dann, told students.

“Owning your own business means constantly looking for the next opportunity, always moving forward and never looking back,” added Dawn Motovidlak ’94, a former Social Work major and president of Business Health Services, the counseling company she bought while an intern in 1999.

The Baltimore Business Breakfast, hosted by College Trustee Phil Enstice ’71, senior vice president for Mercantile-Safe Deposit and Trust, was intended to inspire entrepreneurial-minded students like Sam Slater ’06. After putting himself through college, Slater vowed to make his longtime dream a reality. He is in the final stages of opening a martial arts studio in Laurel, Md.

“I wanted to do something for me, and I’ve been practicing martial arts for 13 years,” he said. “The business major prepared me to understand what’s going on in the real world, and the real world runs on business.”

Participant Tony Bragglio ’04 owns an ATM business, B&B Financial Services. Neal Stokes ’07 created his own line of T-shirts, and Psychology major Jeff Lee ’07 developed an award-winning idea for a digital shopping assistant that wowed the Greater Baltimore Technology Council. After graduation, he hopes to start a company with branches in the U.S., Australia and Korea.
 
“I was looking for a college that would give me something different,” said Lee. “When I put my resume forward, I want people to see that I am unique.”

“Indeed they will,” responded Joe Carter, senior lecturer in Economics and Business. “That’s the great thing about a liberal arts education. You don’t have to major in business to become a business owner.”