Downtown 3/6/2017

Michael LaSage

I spent a good bit of my 20’s touring the country playing music. As a teenager, and throughout my 20’s, in between music, I always worked in restaurants, in various capacities. Somewhere in my late 20’s I realized that I was not on the cover of Rolling Stone, as planned, and so, I started thinking about my future and trying to figure out other ways to have an impact, be creative and still live a bit of that rock ‘n roll lifestyle. Read More>>

Tamiko Hope

I got started interning at LaFace. From there I got my 1st industry job working with Goodie Mob and then Usher. I freelanced for publications like Upscale, XXL, Teen People and Rolling Out and did a few things out in LA with a publicist friend before forming Word Ink. Read More>>

Nirjary Desai

Nirjary has transformed her love for design and travel successfully into a career as an international wedding planner, catering provider and event producer. Her bio is below for your review, thank you in advance for the consideration! Read More>>

Jarrett Stieber

I began providing lunch food for some friends’ coffee pop up in May of 2013 while I waited for a new restaurant to open where I was going to go work. After a month of the daytime popup, the guys moved to dinner doing a night time coffee pop up at Candler Park Market that would focus more on the food aspects I had started doing, which they decided to call “Eat Me,” to be tongue and cheek about the food element of things. Read More>>

Matt Ruppert

I had been working in restaurants as a server and bartender for over a decade and really enjoyed it. But my last job as a server ended poorly; I was fired by a manager whom I did not respect after four years of loyal service. I decided I could never work for anyone else again, so the next day I started composing a business plan for my own place. Read More>>

Kevin Gillese

Founded in 1995, Dad’s Garage Theatre Company has grown from a small volunteer led organization to a thriving mid-size theatre led by professional artistic and administrative staff that includes over 300 volunteers and performers. Read More>>

Tad Mitchell

My wife, Nancy, and I wanted to bring a Pub & Fish House to our neighborhood. Read More>>

Kylene Compaan

I love telling people my story, because I think it’s pretty different from how most people get into business. I studied Sports Media & Communications (clearly not business focused fields) in college. After college I worked as a summer camp director and then an administrator for mission’s training schools and spent a lot of time overseas. Read More>>

Sara Brumfield

I started in the restaurant industry about 13 years ago. I worked every job from back of the house to the front of the house. Along the way, I found that I loved working larger events and helping customize bar packages. When the Events and Beverage Manager Opportunity arose at Fernbank, I knew it was the job for me. Read More>>

Yvonne Gu Khan

My parents have both been chefs for over 40 years. My father got hands-on training from a Master Chef in Chengdu whereas my mom graduated from culinary school. My parents were in the restaurant business for the last 40 years. Read More>>

Graham Loft

Graham moved to San Francisco from Atlanta, Ga in 2001 to pursue his love of skateboarding. He quickly fell into photography which led him down a path in commercial and editorial photography. Read More>>

Daniela Staiculescu

Both my husband Octavian Stan and I have Ph.D.’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Georgia Tech. We are also quite passionate about urbanism and sustainability. Condesa allowed us to be proactive in the transformation of our city into a more walkable, livable environment. We use Counter Culture Coffee and we try to source our ingredients from local, sustainable growers, so we are also privileged to educate and empower people to consumer ethically solid, high quality foods. Read More>>

Blenda DeBerry

Worked in Sales Management and Marketing for more than 35 years. Took and early retirement package and invested in the spa. Love people, know that we need to de-compress and eliminate stress. Solicited a partner and here I am. 9 months into a business that’s a “one-stop-shop” for busy executives, movie producers and the sports and entertainment industries. Read More>>

Tracy Reddick

My two favorite passions are entertaining guests and cooking. Operating a food tour gives me the opportunity to entertain guests while someone else does the cooking. Better yet, I don’t even have to do the dishes! Read More>>

Guy Hollcroft

Chik-n-waffles…What are you crazy???? That’s what my best friend said to me over drinks in a local pub in South Beach around 2:30 in the morning. When I told him I was selling everything and taking my grandmothers “chik-n-waffles to the streets of Atlanta on a food truck. Read More>>

Paul Robinson

I started Viral Booth of Atlanta with my son Justin who was 21 at the time and thought it would be a great small business for him to learn from. We soon realized that this business had a lot of potential for growth due to the widespread popularity of Photo Booths for special events, Bar/Bat Mitzvahs, Sweet 16, corporate events and trade shows, and especially weddings. Read More>>

Raymond & Denise Kelly

Raymond & Denise Kelly, also known as “The Dynamic Duo of Catering and Events”, have honed their gifts to marry his expressive zest for the culinary arts and her ardent zeal for visual design, to embrace their fervor for catering, event design and hospitality. Read More>>

Brian D. Vancil

I was a Chemistry Major at the University of Georgia, and graduated from the Medical College of Georgia School of Dentistry in 2001. I then moved to St. Petersburg Florida, and graduated from the University of Florida with an Advanced Education in General Dentistry certificate in 2002. Read More>>

ALLIE Riebau

We started our journey as a family of Black Belts about 10 years ago. Although there are many reasons why, our passion for the art and love of teaching others is the foundation of our decision to open our own studio. We believe in making the community a better place one black belt at a time by developing each student both mentally and physically with character development and a variety of intense training. Read More>>

James Hammerl

Doggy Dogg has been the making of me and I’ve been the making of Doggy Dogg. I grew up with appreciation for the working the grill outside with my dad and after soaking up and learning as much as I could about hospitality on many, many levels, it was time to put that all together. Read More>>

Jennifer Newton

Gretchen Smith and Jenn Newton are the co-owners of Mugs on Milton. We both worked in downtown Alpharetta and kept hearing people in the area expressing the need for a local coffee shop. Read More>>

Prabha Raghava

“Journey of thousand miles begins with a Single step” –Lao Tzu. We carry a lifetime of memories & few treasured moments in our lives that bring smile & joy in quiet reflection. Read More>>

Santa Gary Casey

Because shaving is a hazard, even with an electric shaver I up a quicking shaving in 1995. As time passed my beard started to fill in on my face and people started looking at in strange ways. Read More>>

Christopher Giorgio

Our business was started back in 2013 my wife Rebekah had been encouraging me to use the talents the God had blessed me with in being able to be a martial artist and to be able to teach it. I was also at the point in my professional career in the electrical design world where I was starting to loose valuable time with my family due to the required hours that the job needed. Read More>>

Tammie Peterson

I became interest in Photography in the late 90’s finding an old camera of my great-grandfather and in the early 2000’s is when I acquired my first digital camera. I began capturing many family functions and gatherings and enjoyed sharing the images and creating a catalog of memories for the family. Read More>>

Antonio Bortone

I immigrated to America at the young age and got my love for cooking and making pizzas mostly from working in several Italian restaurants and pizza places on Long Island NY and around NYC. I started at 15 years old and worked on and off until I was 34 years old. Read More>>

Jeremy Powell

We started in 1991 in the building that is now our rifle range. We began to grow and in 1996 we moved next door to where we currently are and have been growing ever since then. We currently have 7 pistol lanes and 4 rifle lanes as well as a large showroom with an ample inventory! Read More>>

Amy Wilson

I have been in the beauty industry for over 18 years as a nail technician and always wanted to open my own salon. When it came time to do that, I decided to join the rise in the salon suites concept where everyone has the opportunity to work for themselves and have their own mini salons. Read More>>

Kennedy Williams

Well, I grew up around the hair industry (having 12 aunts and uncles) all hair dressers and barbers with a family owned beauty/barber show in Chicago. At 5 years old, I was sitting on my mom’s shoulders and giving my first roller set… As a youth I would follow my aunt to all her hair appointments and drive the stylists’ crazy with all my question… Read More>>

Michael Sink

We started the company out of the garage of the home we were living in at the time in Grant Park. I had come from a job in the special events industry and wanted to make a change to spend more time with my family. I had experience in construction and had learned a lot about different types of building with the events company before leaving. Read More>>

Karissa Norfleet

In Jan 2015, I was really feeling the need for a change from the corporate world. I had been with AT&T for 9 years and sitting at a desk answering to someone else just wasn’t cutting it anymore. We were somewhat new to ATL, 3 years in, and I realized when we first arrived there were no mom and pop donut shops. Read More>>

Susan Kolb MD

Plastikos was founded in 1995 to help patients that were not able to find help within conventional medicine and surgery. Patients ill from defective breast implants with chemical and or biotoxicity, teneosyovitis from chemical toxicity, patients with severe facial and hand injuries and burns that needed complex medical and surgical treatment came to our center for treatment that included plastic surgery, integrative holistic medicine, homeopathy, and detoxification. Read More>>

Alana Joyner

My interest in photography began in high school, but I did not actually start my own business until we moved to Atlanta in 2008. I began photographing weddings with my husband, worked for both Governor Perdue and Governor Deal as their in-house photographer, and when I left the Governor’s office I began shooting more family and pet photography sessions. Read More>>

Billy Allin

I always loved cooking and looked into it as a career several time in college but decided to go the professional root and got a degree in Economics and began in the investment world. I met Kristin (my wife) my senior year of college at College of Charleston, 1995. Read More>>

Doug Lukach

Like many students coming out of school, I wasn’t certain what I wanted to do with my life career wise. I graduated from Florida State University with a double major in management and international business operations, mostly thinking that would combine travel and global exploration with work. Read More>>

Lorena Robinson

From childhood I loved dogs and cared for them as pets. As an adult I and went onto become a Dog Fancier, attending dog shows and becoming a hobby breeder of Yorkshire Terriers. After spending more than 30 years in the Construction industry starting as a trailblazer for women in Construction Management, in 2008 I needed to reinvent myself because the construction industry bottomed out. Read More>>

William Flynn

I have always wanted to be my own boss. I was always tired of working for other people and not feeling appreciated. I wanted to become a person that people enjoyed working for. In 2009, I began to try to figure out what it was that I was going to do in order to be my own boss. Read More>>

Monique Hicks Harrison

Vitality Med Spa opened in 2011 with a small office in Grayson. We specialized in medical weight loss and quickly added to cosmetic injectable to the practice. Read More>>