Pet-care concept wins award.

• Author: GOULIQUER, DIANNE
• Position: Brief Article

Business plan gains recognition in province wide competition

Three Thunder Bay high school students remain undecided about pursuing careers in business, but the trio has an award-winning business idea to fall back on if they ever change their minds.

Bev Sim, Jill Mertson and Kathy Mitton, now OAC students at Hammarskjold High School, earned second place in a provincial business competition last fall for their business plan for a full-service pet-care facility.

The Ontario Business Educator's Association (OBEA) student awards ceremonies and banquet took place in Toronto this past September. The event recognized high school students from across the province for their achievements in various areas of business education at the secondary school level.

The idea to develop a business plan for a pet-care facility came from Mertson, who is "crazy about animals," according to her teammates Sim and Mitton. The exercise was an assignment given to the students last spring by their teacher, Virginia Stead.

"They (the students) had to come up with an original business plan," Stead says. "Each plan had to be in a different industry so that the students were competing against one another."

While most students were looking at creating business plans for restaurants and business directed at youth, Mertson, Sim and Mitton took a different approach, one they say is geared toward better overall pet education and care.

"We were trying to incorporate the positive aspects" of existing pet-care facilities in the city, Mertson says. "Our goal was more than making money; it was avoiding pet abuse."

With Mertson's love for animals as a basis, the three began to construct an "elaborate" business plan that called into play the techniques and principles...