UW celebrates its ‘Wiscontrepreneurs’

by Carl Jaeger

Thursday, March 1, 2007 00:00

A panel of Madison-area entrepreneurs shared their business experiences Wednesday in an effort to tap into the young minds of University of Wisconsin students and promote entrepreneurial awareness.

The panel took place as a part of the national Entrepreneurship Week and included UW graduate Kris Dressler, who came up with an idea for an ultra-fast beer tap dispenser. Dressler thought of "Turbo Tap" while waiting in line at the terrace one summer, and the product is now used around the country, including at Wrigley Field in Chicago.

Dressler said the development and promotional process of product growth and promotion included many hardships, but added that all the hard work paid off.

"It's been a long and hard road," Dressler said. "But it's been incredibly rewarding."

Other panelists included video directors Matt Sloan and Aaron Yonda, whose video "Chad Vader" has become a hit on YouTube.com.

"We were starving artists, working our jobs and making videos part time," Sloan said. "Then Chad Vader hit the big time and allowed us to pursue it full time."

Yonda said Internet video is still a new and developing idea and added he and Sloan are learning more as their products increase in popularity.

"The Internet is a new frontier," Yonda said. "So we're plowing our way through it to find out how to make money on it."

In addition to the panel, various events for Entrepreneurship Week will occur on the UW campus, according to Doug Bradley from the UW Office of Corporate Relations.

"During this week," Bradley said, "educators, community leaders, policy makers and entrepreneurs are going to try, through a variety of events and activities, to ignite the nation's conciseness about the importance of being entrepreneurial."

Wednesday's event coincided with the Ewing Marion Koffman Foundation awarding UW a $5 million grant over the next five years to encourage entrepreneurial endeavors campus-wide, Bradley said.

According to Bradley, 90 percent of the entrepreneurship curriculum taught at universities is through business schools, but 80 percent of the entrepreneurs come from other parts of the campus and other disciplines.

"Koffman is trying to say, 'Look, if you're a dance major, if you're a journalism major, if you're a history major, you too can be an entrepreneur — you don't have to just be a business major,'" Bradley said. "Don't think that because you haven't taken a bunch of classes at the School of Business, or you don't have an accounting or business background, that this isn't for you."

President of the UW Entrepreneur Association Tyler Leeper said he looks forward to what the university will be able to achieve with the grant.

"The goal is to provide a forum where different ideas can meet each other," Leeper said. "Creating a network between all different areas and presenting it to the masses — because that's really where ideas start coming."

Entrepreneurship Week will continue today on the UW campus.

Paul S. Shain, vice president of CDW Corporation and chief executive officer of Berbee Information Networks, will speak today at the Fluno Center at 4 p.m. The "Our Time, Our Renaissance" talent show will also be hosted by The Wisconsin Black Student Union in Humanities at 7 p.m.

UW School of Business lecturer Joe Boucher said he was pleased with Wednesday's panel discussion, and offered advice for prospective entrepreneurs.

"Go for something you'll like, and if you're passionate about it, you'll be successful," Boucher said. "But it takes time and hard work, and very few people succeed right away."

The key to effectively spreading ideas of entrepreneurship around campus is student encouragement, Bradley said.

"We've got big ideas [and] big plans for five years," Bradley said. "But the first thing we've got to do is get people excited and exposed to the idea."