Bloomingdale's was abuzz Thursday, as hundreds of people, including Gov. Josh Green, showed up to support entrepreneurs across Hawai‘i at the Mana Up Showcase.
Mana Up, a business accelerator founded by Meli James and Brittany Heyd, helps Hawai‘i companies expand within the state and globally through a six-month accelerator and alumni program that offers workshops, mentorship and sales opportunities, resources and more.
Its 11th cohort of companies from across the Islands was announced this summer. Just 11 businesses were selected from a record 256 applicants.
The showcase is an annual event that spotlights the Hawai‘i-based companies that have gone through the accelerator program. It is, in essence, the graduation of the current cohort, James told Aloha State Daily at the event.
The event not only features the 11 companies in the current cohort but also celebrates "the growing entrepreneurs and alumni that we have in our program," James continued. "They're all headquartered here in the Islands, so everybody's here and we get to continue on to support their growth and create a great in-person opportunity for people to shop, eat, drink and enjoy the positivity of what's happening with growing entrepreneurship, as well as these incredible companies as they keep evolving with new product launches, new flavors and just getting bigger, badder and better than ever."
ASD caught up with a few of the participating entrepreneurs, asking: How has participating in Mana Up helped you as a business owner? Here's what they had to say:
"It's actually been tremendous," says Jalene Kanani of NOHO HOME, a member of Cohort 3. "The network of the entrepreneurs really helped us to understand that what we were going through, we were not alone, that we had a support system. The resources that Mana Up had brought to us — everything from accounting, knowledge and people in the community to marketing to e-commerce — there really was a plethora of topics and resources that we were able to access. Then we have the alumni network. The alumni network, we meet at least every year, but also throughout the year with different topics — as we grow as a company, things that we didn't know about or think about when we were a little smaller, now they've become pretty important as you scale people and insurance and properties and all the good things."
(ICYMI: NOHO HOME earlier this fall announced a collaboration with Honolulu Cookie Co. Read more about that here).
"Because we come from such a small town in a small state in the middle of the Pacific, we don't know what's out there," says Malie Sarsona, with Waimea Herb Co., a tea, spice and herb company from the Hawai‘i Island community of Waimea and a member of Cohort 11. "But through Mana Up, we got to see what's out there and who's doing what, and we get to speak to those people. It's really cool to be able to talk to all of these people who are doing big things in big places and realize we're exactly the same, we just live in different places. It's really encouraging to know that we're on the right track, all of us that are in this cohort."
Jenna Ikeda, owner of and artist at BUJOBAE, which creates stationery that's "aesthetic and functional for the modern mom and her family," is also a member of Cohort 11; she teared up when asked about the program, which she called an "eye-opening experience."
Her company has just made five years, "so I'm considered a baby business in comparison to all these legends here with me," she told ASD. "I'm just so grateful to be able to to be shoulder-to-shoulder with them and learning so much. I've been a sponge in these last six months of learning. I have no background in business; I'm just a girl who loves to draw and create and create products that are for people and moms just like me who are trying to organize life. ... It's been a great opportunity. I'm just really grateful for all the information and the rooms that I've been in [that otherwise] I don't think I would have had the opportunity to be in. I'm just ultimately super grateful to be able to learn, to be able to grow and I'm just getting started."
Stephanie Salmons can be reached at stephanie@alohastatedaily.com.
For the latest news of Hawai‘i, sign up here for our free Daily Edition newsletter.
