A fourth year UNBC finance and marketing student has received $10,000 from Telus Storyhive for a podcast about entrepreneurship in Prince George.
Brandon Greenall is one of 91 creators from BC and Alberta who got the funding and support from the program called Storyhive Voices, a new program for emerging content creators who want to grow their skills, impact and audience through training and a community of support.
Commerce, Coffee and Community is an already existing podcast that will be further developed by Greenall as Storyhive offers a series of workshops to learn new skills like sound design, editing and videography.
The podcasts will then be showcased on Telus Optik television and then later broadcast on another platform that is yet to be determined.
The idea is to interview established Prince George entrepreneurs who will offer advice while telling the story of how they grew their businesses, Greenall said.
Greenall is looking to feature at least six business owners for his Storyhive project that will also have an educational component to it.
Greenall is a small business owner himself. In 2019 he started Campus Cleaners, a business to business janitorial company. The timing was a challenge as it was just ahead of the pandemic so Greenall knows what it takes to change direction and adapt in a crisis situation and shares his knowledge with his current podcast audience, he explained.
Commerce, Coffee and Community exists now in a different form, Greenall said.
“It’s very limited in production quality right now because we’re working on a student budget to produce it,” Greenall said. “The main difference for what we’ve got going on right now is it’s just about community mentors I’m interviewing to target students who would like to build specific skills.”
For the next phase of the podcast, Greenall hopes to take it up a notch.
“I’d like to feature Prince George’s top entrepreneurs and their stories, especially through Covid, how their business has been impacted, how they’ve overcome that, how they’ve switched gears in their business,” Greenall explained.
He’s also looking forward to the support provided by Storyhive.
“Learning new skills will allow me to step up my game,” Greenall said. “I’m a business student so I don’t really have access to media education and that’s what Telus Storyhive will be providing. So we’ll do quite a few of those workshops in February and that’ll help me hone my skills so I can better create next-level content.”
The idea of the podcast started with the struggles he encountered as a new business owner and he wants to support those experiencing the same kind of challenges he did.
“My number one goal is to provide an educational aspect for students,” Greenall said. “I want the podcast to help students see a different perspective, learn about different careers and to learn different skills in a way you can still teach through COVID - everyone is kind of in love with podcasts right now so this is way to show you can learn using this medium.”
Greenall said he's grateful and excited for the opportunity Telus Storyhive Voices has provided.
He would like to extend an invitation to those business owners who would be interested in sharing their story and insight into how to run a successful business to contact him about appearing on the Commerce, Coffee and Community podcast. To contact Greenall email him at greenall@unbc.ca.
