BIG is Getting Bigger
$3.5 Million in Grants Speeds Expansion
Did you think businesses could grow and expand during the COVID-19 pandemic? That’s exactly what’s been happening with the Business Innovation Group (BIG) at Georgia Southern University.
“We initially saw a big shock,” said Dominique Halaby, DPA, director of BIG. “Then the tide turned dramatically as people started to adjust to a new way of life in developing new business ideas. And we were trying to figure out how we could help them navigate this turbulent environment. So we’ve seen an influx of businesses coming in. We didn’t necessarily anticipate that.”
The growth of BIG during the pandemic showed that innovation is alive and well at Georgia Southern and southeast Georgia as a whole.
BIG is gearing up to help even more businesses as they have received two large Economic Development Administration (EDA) grants from the U.S. Department of Commerce. Written by Halaby, each of those grant proposals required matching funds from the cities or counties in which they were located.
HINESVILLE BUSINESS INCUBATOR
For the Hinesville Business Incubator, the City of Hinesville Development Authority provided the $750,000 cash match to the EDA grant from the U.S. Department of Commerce of $750,000.
“This $1.5 million project will allow us to build a 5,000 square-foot facility right across the street from our Liberty Campus and directly across the other street from the Hinesville Library,” said Halaby. “The neat thing is that this creates a kind of ‘campus feel’ to the area. It will really be a great environment to cultivate new entrepreneurs, give people the support that they need to ultimately be successful in their new business.”
The Hinesville incubator will specialize in engaging with the military, the Department of Defense and the procurement process with the federal government. It also will assist retired veterans and trailing spouses of service members stationed at Fort Stewart.
“We really want to cater this to the military community,” said Halaby. “Not just the veterans, but also their families, as well as people who are trying to cultivate businesses to contract with the military directly. So, this is a great way that we can be of value-add to the people that have given so much in defense of our country.”
Even though the incubator in Hinesville will not be completed for approximately 18 months, BIG is already providing some services to the Liberty County area, and interest keeps growing.
“We are already getting a steady stream of referrals for new businesses wanting assistance,” said Halaby. “So although we don’t have a footprint in Hinesville right now, we can connect them through our virtual component. And we enable them to access our students for internships, our faculty expertise, our research base, our connection through the coastal Georgia Small Business Development Center. Once we have the building built out and actually in play, it takes it to a whole different level.”
GEORGIA GROWN INNOVATION CENTER
The Georgia Grown Innovation Center new business incubator in Metter, Georgia, has been operational since last September. Through a partnership with the Georgia Department of Agriculture’s Georgia Grown initiative and the City of Metter, the incubator focuses on the agriculture sector. Originally targeted to have 10 businesses housed within the space by the end of the first year, the incubator has grown tremendously.
“We’ve been very surprised at how much faster that facility has grown,” said Halaby. “We’re way ahead of schedule in terms of businesses joining the incubator. At six months in, we were already at 15 businesses. So when you think about a pandemic, you kind of think, ‘Oh no, this is going to be terrible.’ And it was initially, but the ramp up, the rebound has just been absolutely remarkable.”
STATESBORO CITY CENTER
Statesboro is not standing still while Metter and Hinesville are expanding. The Downtown Statesboro Development Authority also received a $2 million grant from the EDA to continue boosting business growth and resiliency efforts by expanding the City Center Business Incubator in Statesboro. This is part of the original feasibility study for Statesboro done in 2011 and updated each year. The City of Statesboro also committed $500,000 to expand the facility.
“One of the things that really excites me about this space is the educational dynamics to it,” said Halaby. “Because of the way this facility is structured and in partnership with the city, it’s going to allow us to create a ‘mini-civic center’ so that we can have small scale conferences, primarily business-centered or community-centered events right here in our space downtown.”
The expanded facility will allow BIG to cater to a different clientele and to provide services via the mini-civic center that Statesboro and Bulloch County have been asking for. It will also be a beautiful marker for downtown Statesboro.
“I think that we’ve seen more enthusiasm from community leaders in terms of the value that our University is bringing to downtown,” said Halaby. “People are seeing what was an empty building go through this new sense of life and beautification as a strong prominent thoroughfare into downtown.”
Everything does seem bigger with BIG. – Liz Walker