Chamber presents small businesses awards at luncheon

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Five businesses in Shelby County received the Small Business of the Year Awards co-hosted by the Shelby County and Montevallo chambers at the Community Luncheon on Wednesday at the Pelham Civic Complex. The purpose of the seventh annual awards luncheon was to celebrate the positive impact that small businesses have on the community.

“We want to celebrate their successes and support them in their endeavors,” said Chamber President and CEO Kirk Mancer.

John Collier of Regions Bank said in his comments that Shelby County is an important market for Regions, as they have three operational sites in Shelby County which employ over 3,000 people. Of the 10,000 small businesses in Shelby County, there were 33 nominees.

“The primary purpose of this event is to recognize the tremendous economic impact that small businesses have in our country,” Collier said. “They employ half of all private sector employees, one in 13 U.S. workers is employed by a small business, and in Alabama, 96.8% of employers are small businesses, so we can see just how important they are not only at the national level, but also the community level here in Shelby County."

The companies were evaluated on the following criteria: staying power, growth in number of employees, increase in sales and/or unit volume, response to adversity and evidence of contributions to aid community-oriented projects. The nominated businesses were divided into five categories based on size.

Winners included:

  • Category One (one to five employees) Brittani Morris, State Farm Insurance Agency in Alabaster, which opened in 2016.
  • Category Two (six to 10 employees) Vinehouse Nursery, a childcare facility Alabaster, which opened in 2017 under the leadership of Khiari McAlpin. 
  • Category Three (11 to 20 employees) KAT's Delivery, a prepared food, on-demand and catering delivery service for Metro Birmingham, founded in 2014. 
  • Category Four (20+ employees open one year or more) 280 Animal Medical Center in Westover owned by Dr. Jay Crisman and purchased in 2006.
  • Category Five (new small business with less than 25 employees and opened less than a year) Shiloh Clays, a skeet and clay range located in Southern Shelby County that opened the fall of 2018. 

The luncheon's featured speaker was Drew Ann Long, a Shelby County resident who founded Caroline’s Cart. The former director of finance at Indian Springs School discussed the difficulties she faced as she tried to create an equal shopping experience for those with special needs.

“Being an entrepreneur was something I never thought I would do, but when my daughter Caroline, who has Rhett’s Syndrome and would never walk or talk outgrew a regular shopping cart around age six, I thought there must be a special needs shopping cart somewhere, but it turns out there wasn’t one.”

She spent the next several years and many dollars trying to get a prototype.

“What put me at a different level is that I created a product the consumer wanted but I couldn’t sell to the consumer. Taking on the entire retail industry and trying to convince them it was a needed product in their store was really hard.”

Long’s persistence paid off and now Caroline’s Cart is in 16 countries.

The next Chamber Connections Luncheon will be held June 26 at 11:30 a.m. at the Birmingham Marriott on U.S. 280 and will be hosted by the Tourism & Recreation Work Group. The Bruno Event team will share the impact that tourism has on Shelby County.

The chamber is also offering up to 10 businesses in the Tourism and Recreation sector to participate in the Showcase Feature Program during networking. The Showcase Feature Program is a mini-expo that offers those businesses that participate the opportunity to showcase their products and services to attendees. Showcase Tables are offered on a first-come, first-served basis. For information, contact the Chamber at 663-4542, or info@shelbychamber.org.