Over the next year, Lead to Win will be awarding businesses chosen by the Carleton University Students’ Association’s (CUSA) Hatch program a $1,500 grant.
CUSA announced over the summer that it would be continuing its partnership with Lead to Win, an entrepreneurship incubator at Carleton.
Hatch is a CUSA program that provides student start-ups and businesses with mentorship, resources, and funding opportunities to help them grow, according to their website.
The program will be undergoing revitalization this year, said CUSA president Fahd Alhattab.
According to Alhattab, this includes moving the program from its current location in the Human Computer Interaction building, to a location that is “closer to CUSA.” Students in the program will also have access to Lead to Win’s incubator space in the St. Patrick’s building.
Additionally, Alhattab said CUSA is working towards making Hatch an official student service centre.
“The biggest thing you learn in entrepreneurship is that you have to be continuously learning . . . and pivoting,” Alhattab said. “And so we’ve changed our program and improved our program every year since, and this is just another cycle of improvements based on lessons we’ve had from past years.”
Hatch’s businesses, also called cohorts, are chosen based on presentations given by students in early October to a panel of professionals who judge their start-up plans.
Mallory Rowan, a Carleton alumni, is the co-founder of LVD Fitness, a start-up that was accepted as a Hatch cohort last year.
According to Rowan, LVD Fitness is a clothing company dedicated to the “socially-conscious athlete,” and was initially developed for an entrepreneurship class at Carleton.
After launching their online store in November 2015, Rowan said they saw more than $600 in sales in the first 12 hours.
She added that Hatch provided several helpful resources to her and her co-owner, Josh Reyes.
“The Hatch program provides mentorship, resources, workshops, and a small amount of funding. We are also able to get access to discounted or free tickets for relevant local events to help our startups grow,” Rowan said.
According to Alhattab, of the 12 cohorts that were accepted into the program last year, six have been green-lit to move onto the next stage, which means being part of the Lead to Win program.
“Business is great,” Rowan said. “We are amazed by the support we’ve received—both locally and through the fitness community on social media.”
Alhattab said Hatch is well regarded in the Ottawa community, and other university student unions have asked CUSA how it was started.
“Even some of our students that finish from our incubator and go to a different incubator and start working there, they still say that Hatch is what taught them the most, and that’s where they started,” Alhattab said.
