SDSU Students Work to Strengthen National City Businesses
Under the guidance of the National City Community
Development Commission, Marketing Professor Don Sciglimpaglia’s
Students In Free Enterprise (SIFE) class, with the assistance of
three MBA students and 22 senior business undergraduate students,
was given an exclusive learning opportunity to apply their business
management expertise for six small National City Businesses.
Since February, student teams have been working with
National City small business owners on a weekly basis. Students
have provided various business consulting services including accounting,
marketing, web page design, financial analysis and strategic business
planning – all according to the specified needs and goals defined
by the company. The participating businesses were Caroline’s
Flowers, La Sierra Café, TropiFrutas, Niederfranks Ice Cream,
Old Recipes (now Ben’s 1615) and the National City Community
Development Commission.
Don Sciglimpaglia's SIFE class pose with their
business clients at National City's Chamber of Commerce.
National City’s Deputy Director of Community
and Economic Development Robert Paz says the program is not just
an internship. “The Technical Assistance Program signifies
a partnership which not only focuses on the development of the students,
but a commitment to the community. While it gives these students
hands-on experience and skills for use in their future, the students
will perform an even bigger service by committing their time to
the community and contributing to National City’s smaller businesses
that have long been an underserved segment of the county’s
business community. Most focus on new jobs and businesses; our focus
with this collaboration is revitalizing this community and those
entrepreneurs who have always been here to help them compete in
today’s economy.”
Professor Don Sciglimpaglia said, “At SDSU, we
encourage our students to get out of the classroom and work with
actual businesses. The National City Technical Assistance Program
is part of our award-winning Small Business Institute and Students
in Free Enterprise (SIFE) programs. Later in the year, the student
consulting projects results will be entered into judged competitions.
Our SIFE program has been a regional winner eight of the past ten
years.”
TROPI FRUTAS PROJECT:
A Win-Win for Students and Business
A Student's Story by: Katia Sarti-Adams, Senior,
Marketing
On the first day of class, we were all very excited about having
the opportunity to apply what we have learned in business school.
We looked at the businesses in National City and chose Tropi Frutas,
a juice bar with a Mexican atmosphere. It is a very young business,
seeking some much needed help on new ways to market itself. Our
client had knowledge of the food industry, due to the fact that
he had owned a restaurant business before.
We set out to accomplish four goals for our client:
1. Increase Tropi Frutas’ name recognition and awareness in
the community
2. Increase store traffic
3. Help with Tropi Frutas’ Grand Opening
4. Create a website
In order to accomplish these goals, we conducted primary
and secondary research. The primary research consisted of client
meetings, collection and analysis of customer surveys, sales records,
and Tropi Frutas’ competition. The secondary research was focused
on the juicebar industry, the benefits and structure of a grand
opening event, as well as best practices for websites in related
industries.
The primary and secondary research allowed us to analyze
Tropi Frutas’ business and industry more carefully in order
to recommend improvements to achieve the ultimate goal of growth.
The whole project and its various stages was extremely
valuable to us. We have learned some essential “real world”
skills that cannot be learned in a classroom. We are very pleased
to have accomplished our goals for this client, as well as helping
Tropi Frutas achieve its goals.
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