Photo by Tom Campbell

The 2007 Purdue Agriculture Team Award recipients are: Front row, left to right: Bernie Tao, Vickie Hadley, Maria Marshall, Margaret Zoglmann, Maud Roucan and Kevin Keener. Second row: Steve Swain, Kirby Hayes, Linda Heckaman, Freddie Barnard and Steve Smith. Third row: Laura Hoelscher, Joy May, Jerry Nelson, Joan Fulton, Betty Jones, Jane Anderson and Steven Engleking. Fourth row: Chris Sigurdson, Jennifer Dennis, Aissa Irvin, Craig Dobbins and Nick Held. Back row: Tom Jordan, Jim Luzar, Kwamena Quagrainie, Allan Gray, Michael Boehlje and Dan Wilson. Not pictured are Jay Akridge, Alice Alderson, Sam Cordes, Kelly Easterday, Ken Foster and Stacy Herr.

A 35-member group of Purdue Extension county educators and university specialists dedicated to helping entrepreneurs launch and expand Indiana businesses is the largest team ever to win the Purdue Agriculture Team Award.

Begun in 2002, the New Ventures Team helps people evaluate, develop and expand all types of commercial enterprises. The team obtained a $1 million USDA-Rural Development Program grant to form the Agricultural Innovation and Commercialization Center (AICC) in 2003.

“We started the New Ventures Team to respond to community needs based on questions received in county Extension offices and offices here on campus,” says Joan Fulton, Purdue professor of agricultural economics and co-chair of the team. “The AICC philosophy is to provide tools so people can evaluate and analyze business ideas themselves.”

The other co-chairs named in the award are Jerry Nelson, Purdue New Ventures educator (for New Ventures), and Michael Boehlje, professor of agricultural economics (for AICC).

The New Ventures/AICC Team provides assistance through one-on-one consultations, publications, workshops, research and INVenture, the online tool for developing a business plan. The team has presented more than 70 workshops to more than 1,800 people since its inception. The topics include grant writing, new business evaluation, organic foods, agritourism, starting a food business, and targeted sales and marketing.

“One of our most popular workshops is ‘Bigger Profits through Targeted Sales,’” Fulton says. “People who have never attended an Extension event before have taken advantage of these.”

In nominating the New Ventures/AICC Team, Sally Thompson, head of Purdue’s Department of Agricultural Economics, said the group is the epitome of teamwork.

“The Purdue New Ventures/AICC Team exemplifies a group of diverse Extension professionals joining together to address an important societal need to a significant target audience,” her nomination stated. “Their efforts have stimulated and supported entrepreneurial activity.”

Randy Woodson, Glenn W. Sample Dean of Agriculture, says the team has been successfully innovative in developing the materials to meet the needs of those interested in initiating or expanding a business.

“Their workshops and publications are so appropriate for spurring economic development that professionals in other states are adopting them,” Woodson says.

The team has produced a series of publications available online that cover the workshop topics and other areas relevant to business development. The materials are listed at www.agecon.purdue.edu/newventures/.

Fulton says that people who come to the New Ventures/AICC seminars and who use the publications are in three different categories:

1) Farmers who want to expand beyond traditional farming into areas such as agritourism, ethanol or corn masa.

2) Farm families who want to start a separate business not connected to the farm.

3) Small and medium businesses not associated with agriculture. About 75 percent of the attendees at sales and marketing workshops last fall were from nonagricultural businesses, including home heating contractors, financial planners, florists, beauty product salespeople, a towing service owner and a pest control business owner.

Contact Fulton at fultonj@purdue.edu