Huntington’s Virtual Enterprise Firms Notch Success

Huntington High School’s CleanClip, Embrace and Xtinguish Virtual Enterprise firms recently competed in the first round of the National Business Plan Competition and the NYS/NE Regional Trade Show at Long Island University.

After over a month of intense preparation and feedback from various VE alumni, teachers, and administration, including Grace Oliva, Emma Gutierrez, Grayson Dunn, Bradley Contreras, Suzi Biagi, Patricia Avelli, Dianna Cazzalino, Rochelle C. Brown, Beth McCoy, Brenden Cusack, and LIU Dean of Business Chris Bates, all three firms delivered their best presentations to date in front of the panel of judges.

“It is always nerve-racking for me watching in the back of the room as our students finally get to show off all the hard work they have done throughout this year, but each firm truly rose to the occasion and wowed every judge in the room,” said Bryan Outsen, the high school business teacher who leads the Virtual Enterprise program. “Not only were their presentations engaging, animated, and informative, their Q&A sessions were nearly flawless and every firm walked out feeling confident and happy with their performance, which is all I can ask for as their teacher. The top 50 firms will move on to the second round on February 23 and we will find out the results of who moves on Tuesday morning.”

While this was happening across campus, the other members of Huntington’s three firms excelled on the trade show floor as they were tasked with selling their products to the other 76 firms from 51 different schools in the region. “We were able to set a new trade show record for Huntington, surpassing half a million dollars in revenue across all three firms,” Mr. Outsen said.

While this year's show was significantly smaller in size than last year, Huntington's CleanClip claimed one of only 20 awards presented, receiving a Gold for Sales Pitch, which recognizes them as one of the top five firms of the entire competition.

“This was yet another successful year for Huntington’s VE program and while we wait for our business plan presentation results, students will be hard at work submitting their written plans for their individual department competitions on February 6,” Mr. Outsen said.