As everyone knows who is reading this blog, I am enrolled in the MSc. in Sport Management program at University of Ulster. As a part of this program, one of the classes I am required to take is called “Enterprise and New Venture Creation.” This class is essentially an entrepreneurship class where the goal is to work in groups to create a product and sell it. This is probably one of my most interesting classes so that is why I wanted to write about it.
To start, we are given £100 by the University of Ulster that we can use to create, supply, market, or do whatever else might be needed for our product. I am working in a group of five people who bring a wide range of talents to the table. Two of the individuals in our group play for the Belfast Giants, a local professional hockey team. The Belfast Giants actually have a large following in the area so we thought it would be great if we sold a product related to their team. After doing more research we found that the Belfast Giants do not sell a yearly team calendar. The Belfast Giants players in our group talked to their management and got approval for us to sell a calendar for 2017!
This is an exciting but difficult project to work on. We are planning to have our calendar finalized within the next week and then we should be able to have a prototype to present to everyone (contact me on Facebook if you’re interested!) It’s becoming more and more real that we will have a product to actually sell to Belfast Giants fans and anyone else who is interested. The best part about the project is that we get to keep all the profits from the calendars that we sell at the end of the semester so let’s cross our fingers that we sell out! #GrindTime