An incipient Wrangell business has won the 2017 Path to Prosperity business competition, which includes a $25,000 grant award for starting up.
Calling her business Mighty Bear Roots, resident Dixie Booker has proposed developing an aeroponic garden to cultivate and sell fresh produce. In this method plants would be grown in specialized tray towers, rooted in a soilless medium and sustained through a blend of mineral nutrients and water, and controlled lighting.
Booker said the idea for the business came to her out of a need for fresher produce. Plants begin to decompose after harvest, and lengthy travel time by barge to local markets means diminished shelf life for many greens and vegetables. Growing something closer to home would thus give consumers a little more bang for their buck by reducing spoilage.
Aeroponics would be an ideal way to grow produce in Wrangell given its climate, she explained. Spotty sunlight and heavy rainfall can make traditional gardening difficult, with relatively brief growing seasons. Kept in a covered, enclosed space, aeroponic towers protect produce from the elements and from pests while also maximizing space.
“It just kind of stacks together. The ones I will be using will be holding 28 plants apiece. I’ll start out with 12 of them,” Booker said. “I bought one initially. It was like a giant science experiment to see how I liked it. I was really impressed with how the produce grew and how quickly it grew, and the quality and the flavor that came out of it. So I knew that was something I wanted to stick with.”
Once acquired, these would at first be kept in a covered porch at the Booker home, though eventually the plan is to expand the operation to a 70-by-30-foot greenhouse. She would plan to make use of a ground-to-air heating transfer unit in the design as well, controlling the interior climate for year-round growing.
“That’ll probably be a couple of years down the road from now,” she guessed.
In the meantime she will focus on raising lettuce and herbs, while gauging the local palate. Booker would be building up a client base and developing her business, selling produce to residents and restaurants. If things work out as planned, it would demonstrate Might Bear Roots’ viability for the purpose of acquiring a loan to build the greenhouse and buy more towers.
The Path to Prosperity funds will help her along in that direction, along with skills picked up through the program’s business development “boot camp” its competition finalists go through. The P2P competition is put on each year by the groups Spruce Root and the Nature Conservancy, in order to encourage the development of local, sustainable businesses in Southeast Alaska communities. During the fall, 12 of its picked finalists get to participate in the weekend skills training sessions.
Mighty Bear Roots was also picked as a finalist during the 2016 competition, so last year’s process was Booker’s second run through. Though at first not picked for an award, Booker explained the P2P training gave her the necessary tools to revise her business model and apply for the grant successfully.
“I didn’t know how to write a business plan or anything when I first started, and it was very, very frustrating,” she recalled. “Luckily I’ve had a lot of help, and a lot of people to steer me in the right direction.”
She already has plans for how to use the $25,000, not for materials or equipment but for further business support.
“We’re using it for logo design and possibly packaging,” Booker said.
It will also go toward more hands-on training. When completed she figures the aeroponic greenhouse will be the first of its kind in Southeast. To do it successfully though, she would like to see how other producers tend their plants and cycle their crops. “There are two different sites, there’s one in Arizona and one in Florida. And they do the commercial greenhouse using the towers that I’m going to be using here.”
Of the dozen finalists in the P2P contest, two businesses are each year selected to receive up to $25,000 apiece in startup funding. Even after the competition, the program continues to stay in touch with previous finalists and work closely with its winners, working with them to invest wisely and continue developing their business strategy. This approach is hoped to boost local commerce while also benefiting their prospective communities.
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