Business mentor program to open Cape site

Sally Suchman is on a hiring spree. Wanted: high school and college students who wish to start their own business.

Prominent Youth, a not-for-profit organization, is coming to Cape Girardeau.

Started in Kansas City in 2005, the organization pairs teens with mentors and requires them to develop a business plan, advertise, keep track of a budget and run a business.

Students get paid $8.50 an hour, and most mentors are volunteers.

Suchman, the regional manager for Prominent Youth of Southeast Missouri, is getting ready to sign a lease on a 1,000-square-foot building on North Kingshighway for the organization.

"Regardless of skill level, it gives students a chance to do what they what want to do," said Jessica Savage, the student president of Prominent Youth.

Savage, a freshman at Park University, produced a Christmas CD while working for an internal business of Prominent Youth called PY Productions. Savage gathered musicians, made contacts at a production studio and wrote and recorded a few songs herself. She and a team of students designed a cover and sold copies of the CD at a high school.

"I went from having a job that I didn't really like to a job where I got to do what I wanted and get paid for it," she said.

Can buy out business

Once a business becomes profitable, students have several options.

They can continue working under the umbrella of Prominent Youth; they can split profits with Prominent Youth, keeping 75 percent but being responsible for growth and wages; or they can buy out the business, Savage said.

Other student businesses established in Kansas City include a photography studio, a scrapbooking company and an outlet that sells discounted golf equipment.

Suchman said students in Cape Girardeau will have the option of establishing their own businesses or building off existing Prominent Youth businesses. Such businesses are Array Magazine, an entertainment publication; Student to Student, which helps teens create resumes; and PY Productions.

Money comes from donations and grants. Suchman has joined the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce and intends to seek sponsors soon. Hiring posters have been hung at area high schools, and Suchman hopes to move into the new office in January.

Prominent Youth is also expanding to Madison, Wis., and Dallas. Southeast Missouri was selected because founder Scott Beeson is from Perryville.

Savage admits that she was skeptical when she first heard about the organization.

"I thought PY was another nonprofit that helped troubled teens and tried to be inspirational. I didn't get the whole fact that they actually paid students to start own business," she said. "It was a great new idea for me."

lbavolek@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 123