1/20/2016 11:41:58 AM
UPDATED: January 28, 2016
College of the North Atlantic student, Alex Hennifent, walked away with second place from the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards, Atlantic Canada Qualifiers last week in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Hennifent, a Grand Falls-Windsor native, started his business, VOLTFUSE, five years ago when he was just 14. While it started as a way to promote local snowboarding in his hometown, Hennifent has since turned his passion for snowboarding into something much more – a successful Newfoundland-based headwear and clothing brand.
That success garnered him a spot at the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards as the only student entrepreneur selected from Newfoundland and Labrador. Hennifent went head to head against four other student entrepreneurs for the chance to represent Atlantic Canada at the nationals in Toronto, Ontario. While the first place winner moved on to compete against the world’s best student entrepreneurs at the Global Finals for their chance at the grand prize of $50,000, Hennifent came in second during the competition, which he believes may even be better.
Hennifent’s prize is valued at $15,000 and includes a promotional video from Journeyman Films, owned and operated by filmmaker Matthew Welsh, four quarterly strategy session in Halifax, Air Miles for two business trips in North America, a full personal or business-wide financial assessment, and admission to a student entrepreneurship conference in Halifax in February.
“Obviously placing first would be fantastic, but now that I look at it I am thinking the prizes that were included for second place may even be better in my opinion,” Hennifent said
Hennifent says it was a great experience to be able to tell the story behind VOLTFUSE and the future plans he has for the company.
“I'm very happy with how I performed and the information I presented, but like anything there is always room to improve. I have some more future events coming up so being able to attend this was a great trial-run to prepare me for the future events,” he said.
“I'm also very excited to get to work with the very reputable Journeyman films. It's still not set in stone as to what the film will be exactly, but we will be working together to develop a film for VOLTFUSE. This will be a large boost to my marketing for sure! Along with all of the other prizes included, they will definitely be utilized to the maximum. I am very excited to see what the future brings.”
For more information about Hennifent’s business, VOLTFUSE, visit www.voltfuse.com.
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Original story posted January 20, 2016
College of the North Atlantic student, Alex Hennifent, has been selected to participate in the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards, Atlantic Canada Qualifiers event on Thursday, Jan. 21 in Halifax, Nova Scotia. The only student entrepreneur selected from Newfoundland and Labrador, Hennifent will compete against four other student entrepreneurs for a chance to represent Atlantic Canada at the nationals in Toronto, Ontario. The winner then moves on to compete against the world’s best student entrepreneurs at the Global Finals for their chance at the grand prize of $50,000.
Hennifent, a Grand Falls-Windsor native, started his business, VOLTFUSE, five years ago when he was just 14. While it started as a way to promote local snowboarding in his hometown, Hennifent has since turned his passion for snowboarding into something much more – a successful Newfoundland-based headwear and clothing brand.
“I started VOLTFUSE in June 2010 because I love snowboarding. I knew the chances of making it as a professional, paid snowboarder were very unlikely so I needed to find a way that would allow me to snowboard and do something that I loved. That inspired me to create a headwear and clothing brand, focused on snowboarding and skateboarding,” Hennifent said.
“Looking at the snowboard industry, I knew that a lot of the brands owned by corporations are not snowboarder owned and driven, and that’s what I wanted to position the brand as; creating products by snowboards for snowboarders. I’m tall and skinny so growing up I had hard time finding comfortable fitting clothing. That inspired me to create a tall fitting clothing line for lanky, skinny people to encompass snowboarding and causal fitting clothing.”
He started off small, with an initial investment of just $500 which he used to buy blank t-shirts and screen printing supplies. Originally Hennifent handmade all of the products himself.
“I spent my time printing the shirts and hand sewing on the tags and patches on the hats and facemasks. I used to get my friends and local snowboarders throughout Newfoundland to wear the products and endorse it. Through their snowboarding and travels more people heard about the brand. From their feedback I was able to improve the product and ultimately grow the brand over time.”
Reinvesting all of his profits kept him from taking out loans and eventually moved the production to overseas suppliers.
“I design the product, source it, market it, advertise it, I do it all myself. The business allows me to apply my creative outlook to develop new types of products and improve them. It’s sold in retailers throughout Newfoundland, as well as online, which makes it available all over the world,” he said.
“It’s in the core area of snowboarding and skateboarding and I sponsor athletes all across the world who endorse the brand. I sponsor 20 snowboarders worldwide who are up-and-coming professional snowboarders that I’ve met through my travels while snowboarding, and who I felt would be a good asset to the brand. They fit my brand image so I use them to promote it through the contests they compete in and snowboard movies they are featured in.”
His passion for snowboarding brought him to Corner Brook, so he could access to the west coast ski resort at Marble Mountain and also attend CNA’s Business Administration Marketing program. Now 19, Hennifent is in his second year of studies.
“I had the practical, from running and starting a business myself, but then I wanted to apply more of the book background. I wanted to get some actual structure behind it and to back it all up with book knowledge. CNA best suited me because I didn’t want to do university for four years. I wanted something quicker so I could have something to show for it in less time.”
He hopes to put what he’s learned from his time at CNA, and the Enactus team he’s involved in, to good use during the upcoming Atlantic Canada qualifiers.
“I’m comfortable with my material. I live the business every day and I know it like the back of my hand, so I’m pretty comfortable. I just have to get up and cover everything. I have a 12-minute time frame and I’ve got a lot to cover, so I guess my biggest obstacle will be to try to fit it all in to that 12 minutes. I’ve done a lot over the past five years so I have to squeeze most of it in.”
For more information about Hennifent’s business, VOLTFUSE, visit www.voltfuse.com.
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Media Contact:
Glenda McCarthy
Public Relations Specialist
College of the North Atlantic
709.643.6408
glenda.mccarthy@cna.nl.ca