Two University of Iowa college students went beyond crowdfunding to take a semester overseas with the aid of starting their commercial enterprise. Now, after a successful fundraising, the enterprise indicates to have the existence of its personnel. University of Iowa college students Taylor Williams and Kennedy Voss began Wanderlust Wraps in May 2018, selling headbands to raise cash for the Semester at Sea Study Abroad Program. After returning from the program, Williams and Voss joined the Founders Club for UI student marketers, and they could see their enterprise expanding. That was the best way we would get there,” Voss stated. “We wanted to do Semester at Sea and, with the hefty rate tag that includes it, we didn’t know how we would do it unless we created a commercial enterprise or some typical method to get us there.
Voss and Williams met as Division-1 athletes on the Hawkeye rowing team and shaped a friendship after having a mutual dislike at the onset. After quitting the team, they labored on building their business. Semester at Sea isn’t a UI. Look at abroad software; the student prices can be more than $25,000. Elizabeth Wildenberg de Hernandez, senior partner director of the UI Study Abroad packages, said the value of Semester at Sea is on the higher stop of maximum applications. It’s exceptional to peer students who are being entrepreneurial,” Hernandez said. “I assume that’s encouraging, and I’m not positive I’ve seen that before. During their 106 days at Sea, Voss and Williams saw eleven nations and 15 towns and shared a ship with 500 other college students from all corners of the sector when they had been distant places.
Wanderlust Wraps was controlled by using a circle of relatives. Voss, an organization-management main, and Williams, a communications principal, stated the idea for their product came from the hassle of their headbands slipping and falling off during exercises and rowing. Their wraps are hand-crafted with a cloth that gripes the hair and lives in the location. Before going to Sea, they staked out spots in front of Iowa Book and at the Farmers” Market over the summertime and fall semesters of 2018, taking each possibility to sell their wraps. Voss used her classes at the Tippie College of Business to learn about developing and handling a new enterprise.
