It’s been a big year for the Entrepreneurship Club. After last year’s successful run with the belts, president and founder James Schroeder ’15, vice president Matthew Favre ’16, and the club’s moderator Mrs. Dea Ochs have been hard at work, hoping to expand with more guest speakers, activities, and ideas. So far this year, the club has seen the final sales of the belts, a new round of the Stock Market Game competition, and multiple guest speakers.
First, some background. The Entrepreneurship Club strives to teach members about the bustling world of business. Schroeder, when asked why he started the club, replied, “I started the club because I am very interested in how peoples’ ideas for products and services, as well as companies’ products and services, are successfully executed in the marketplace. At a young age, I always wondered, ‘How is it possible that I am holding this toy?’ Nowadays, I wonder, ‘How is it possible that I am holding this iPhone, and why am I holding an iPhone rather than an Android?’ With the Entrepreneurship Club, I have been given the opportunity to find the answers to these types of questions and understand the product marketplace. I also created the Entrepreneurship Club with the intention of taking away the fear of making a business model for a product. Another big reason I created the club was because there were no money-related classes that were available to freshmen, sophomores, or juniors, so I thought the Entrepreneurship Club would provide an opportunity for underclassmen to learn.”
On general meeting days, discussion ranges from finance and investing, which centers heavily on the stock market, to marketing and management, where members throw around new product ideas and learn about important concepts for future business aspirations. Schroeder explained how he attacks meetings: “I first think about what would be the most important topics to talk about, considering that we only have a limited amount of meetings and countless topics. Then, once I choose a topic, for example, ‘Ideation,’ I research the topic and usually make a short PowerPoint with no words, just pictures. I then incorporate some activity at the end. For example, with the topic of ideation, the activity was to make 50 product ideas in less than 3 minutes, given that the products can be made only out of water bottles.” Competition thrives at the center of the club with the Stock Market Game. Members pay a $5 entry fee in order to participate, buying and trading stocks in hopes of making the most money possible. At the end of the year, the member with the most money wins a prize.
This year, much of the club’s excitement has been found with guest speakers. On a FaceTime call, club members heard Kevin VanDeraa speak about his experiences with starting and running a business. VanDeraa, a friend of Mrs. Ochs, won $50,000 on the Food Network show Cupcake Wars. He invested this money in his own company Cupcake, a franchise in Minneapolis, MN. The chef-turned-small business owner spoke about everything from flavor creation to business models. When asked about his business strategies, VanDeraa expressed the importance of keeping up with trends of the market. “We saw that the gluten-free food market was getting bigger, so we tried to target that with gluten-free cupcakes.” Also touching on his experience with the cupcake industry, he mentioned that, “Cupcakes are on a big high right now, there’s been a big peak in this business lately. People have decided that they want something that satisfies their sweet-tooth, but don’t want to buy a giant cake.” With this idea though, he also spoke on diversification, mentioning his second store in the Cupcake franchise as well as a budding restaurant. Throughout the discussion, students were allowed to ask individual questions about any aspect of the restaurant business, and what his keys to success were. Overall, Schroeder felt good about the meeting, noting that the chain owner “gave great insight into niche product markets and proved how winning a TV show can really help your business grow!”
The club also met with Jim Ruppel, the Director of Customer Relations at Southwest Airlines. Mr. Ruppel spoke about how he moved up the ranks of the company, starting off as just a baggage handler and climbing the corporate ladder to his current position. After mastering his job driving the luggage to the ramp, Ruppel made a habit of going above and beyond, helping load the plane to make sure the flights would leave on time. When a job opened up, he was the first one called in since he already knew what to do. He employed the same strategy at that position: “I’d come in at 11:30 or 12:00, and work for the manager of the bag representative office, learning that job. Then I’d change my clothes, put my uniform on and go throw bags on the ramp. I’d do that 2 or 3 times a week, and guess what? As soon as there’s an opening, guess who the manager is looking for? He calls me, so I start working that job, get my rhythm, and begin looking around again. There’s a central baggage service office, where all the unclaimed baggage comes in and they settle the property loss claims. So again I come in, work from 3:00 to midnight, and go in and learn from the woman managing there. When she went on maternity leave, she decided to be a stay at home mom and didn’t come back. So I got recommended for her job. You just put yourself in position to do these things.”
When asked what it took to move from someone who drove cars full of luggage around to where he is now, Ruppel responded, “You know, I think you’ve got to have some lucky breaks, which I got. I think that, to be really honest, you have to dedicate time and effort, you have to be at the right place at the right time, and I don’t have any specialized degree…I don’t have a CPA, I’m not a pilot.” He regaled the story of his first interview with the company: “The HR Department was one guy. He asked me what I wanted to do, and I said, ‘Well Ed, I’d like to get into your management training program.’ To which he responded, ‘OK. So would you like to start on the ramp or in reservations?'” Ruppel also gave advice, warning students that, “You have to be very intentional about your career, because there’s nobody that cares about it as much as you do…You’ve got to be really careful about always overachieving. Give them what they want.”
He also touched on Southwest’s growth as a company, mentioning that, “When I started we had 12 planes, today we have 700. The customer relations department has also changed quite a bit. When I started in Customer Relations in 1980, there were two of us; now we have 330. I think that what’s been fun to watch is the company’s change every decade.” On how Southwest created a company culture that centers around customer service, Ruppel explained, “That really starts at the top. All of our founders had the philosophy of: treat your employees well; as a result, they’ll be happy, and will treat the customers well. It’s a really simple idea, but they embraced it at the top. Are you really going to tell a boss no when he asks you to treat people well? At this point, you couldn’t blast that culture out of Southwest Airlines. Has it changed? Sure it’s changed somewhat, but that caring for each other, it’s like a big family. We have squabbles and those types of things, but at the end of the day, it’s all still there. I don’t think there’s a definition for what that culture is, so it’s really about being respectful to each other. You can have controversy, but as long as you’re respectful about it, everything’s fine. And it still translates into customer satisfaction. We get thousands of commendations every month.”
Ruppel also responded to some complicated issues, such as how his department deals with keeping customers happy in light of the more stringent, stress-inducing security of post-9/11 air travel: “We do get complaints where the customer’s perception is that we’re responsible for the security. So with long lines and those types of things, they think it’s us. We’re actually partners with homeland security, so we constantly work with them, and give them the customer feedback we receive…We send out surveys daily, which reach around 11,000 customers, asking about their experiences in general, but we gather data about the security checkpoints too, and give that to groups like the TSA and our own security to see how we can improve.”
Schroeder also reflected on this meeting as a success, sharing that, “Mr. Rupple, the Southwest Airlines head of Customer Relations, was great for our club members because he explained how his hard work and friendliness helped him succeed at Southwest. He explained that because Southwest puts lots of its resources into elevating the customer experience, it is able to beat its competitors and amongst a somewhat distanced corporate world.” He also mentioned future plans for the club, saying that, “My future plans for the club are for it to continue to be a cornerstone club for Jesuit and for it to grow even more. As of now, the club is comprised of mostly juniors and seniors but I want more sophomores and freshman involved in the club.” Meetings will resume on Thursdays during 6th period lunch.
