Austin Torrence
About Me
Austin Torrence is a junior from Illini West High School and lives in LaHarpe, Illinois. He is the president of FBLA (Future Business Leaders of America), treasurer of Key Club, member of Student Council, member of the Scholastic Bowl Team, and also a member of the State Finalist Cross Country Team that made their first ever trip to state this year. In his free time, Austin likes to hang out with friends and watch his favorite teams in many different sporting events. When not in school, he works two part time jobs at Jenni's Ice Cream & Grill and HyVee. He also has college classes that he is taking which keeps him very busy. This summer, Austin will be attending Southeastern Community College in Burlington, Iowa, to get his CNA to start his career towards becoming an RN. He is still deciding whether to start college at SCC or to go to a four year university such as the University of Iowa.
"CEO has not only taught me business skills recognized by the people in Hancock County, but it has taught me skills recognized by business leaders across the state of Illinois."
About My Business
Austin's business is called 2nd Avenue Creations. He creates custom pillow cases and lanyards for sale at vendor blenders and trade shows. Also, he can repair clothing with rips and holes for customers. He came up with the name for his business by wanting to remember where he grew up when he goes off to college. The street that Austin lives on is 2nd Avenue, so he used that as the spark he needed to name his business. A lot of people may ask why Austin wanted to start a sewing business and he can tell you why. Austin has an aunt named Vicky that has a hobby of sewing many different types of things. She has a knack for scrap booking, so he wanted to keep the family tradition alive by starting his own sewing business. Also, we don't see many types of sewing businesses around Hancock County. You can reach Austin at austintorrence99@gmail.com.My Featured Journal Entries
“CEO has not only taught me business skills recognized by people in Hancock County but, it has taught me skills recognized by business leaders across the state of Illinois.”
05/14/2017
We are one week away from the end of CEO. CEO has sorta become a lifestyle for me.
05/07/2017
WOW we are 2 days from the Trade Show and I could not be more excited and nervous to show off my products! We have been working so hard on these businesses that we feel that we are ready to get this trade show over with. I think all of us are excited to show members of the community what we have been working on and the time we have spent into developing our businesses.
On Tuesday we traveled to Outlaw Tees in Nauvoo. I am very fascinated by the printing business so this was a fun visit for me. The biggest thing that I took away from John was that you have to be able to listen and work with your customers which is true in any business.
04/30/2017
The treehouses were amazing and it’s really a business that you would think that Hancock County would ever have. My favorite treehouse was the Captain's Quarters because it had a lot of neat stuff in there and was decorated just like a ship which was really cool. The biggest thing Mr. Hopp told us to take away was to stick to your strengths which has been the biggest key in developing my business and getting ready for the trade show.
04/23/2017
As the weeks go by in CEO, I always take the time to reflect on how I have changed since the start of the year. On Friday, Beth Boley gave me some tips on some types of insurance I would need to have in my business.
04/09/2017
This week the thing that wowed me was the guest speaker Dwight Mulch. It was very interesting to hear about how he started his business. He was an environmental chemist that was working in a factory in Keokuk. He was then able to move up the ladder and create his own business that has spread to many states across the Midwest. He gave us some great tips when starting our businesses. The biggest tip he gave us like all of the speakers is that you have to be passionate about what you're doing because if you're not ever going to succeed because you won't want to put any work into your business. He also told us to be persistent and let the business come to you, and also to not push your business and try to expand it too fast because you will end up in a hole financially.
I loved the business visit to Peters Greenhouse in Lomax. It was awesome to see how much the greenhouse has expanded from the last time I had visited. This business really showed us how much hard work pays off in the end.
04/02/2017
My favorite part of CEO this week was the talk we had on Friday with Keith Yex from WCAZ. He came to speak on how we can use the radio to market our business. We also found out this week that community involvement is key to opening a successful business as we heard from Kim Ourth of the Nauvoo Tourism Office. She told us that you have to be involved in the community to get your name out there because if you don’t you really won’t get your business recognized by community members. I couldn’t believe all of the things that Kim was involved with in the community and how it has helped her business.
03/19/2017
This week in CEO we gave our business plan presentations to board members in our community to get feedback. The feedback that I received on Thursday enabled me to gain new ideas for my business that I never thought about before. I think doing the presentations really helped me figure out some of the kinks I had with my business plan and to really figure out where my business is going to go.
03/12/2017
The most exciting thing in CEO this week was the class business. I think the time that we had to regroup between finishing up the panel speeches and taking photos before lunch helped us realize that it doesn’t matter if you forget your speech as long as you can talk about how CEO has impacted you. I was surprised with the number of people we had that took the time after the conference to go down the line and shake our hand. It really made us feel that we had finally succeeded.
02/26/2017
The most exciting thing in ceo this week was our trip to Memorial Medical Clinics. Stephanie was a very good speaker. Although she was not sure that she wanted to go into Health Care, once she entered she didn't want to let go. She gave us a wonderful tour of the facilities and talked about how she controls the other branches of clinics. One thing that stuck out to me during her presentation was you have to be passionate in everything you do while you are working with your patients because it's going to leave those patients with a better effect on you and they will remember you and refer to you the next time you come back.
02/12/2017
The most exciting thing in CEO this week was the business visit to Royal Printing. Dan Asbury was a wonderful speaker with his stories about how he started his business and how he bought out his competition to open his business. It was amazing to hear how many prints he can do in 2 hours with only 12 employees. The key point he was trying to get across to us was to think of the worst possible thing that could happen when starting your business and just go after it when you start.
02/05/2017
The most exciting part of CEO this week would be our guest speaker, John Perles. His discussion about the PDP was very motivating and he really knew how it worked and knew what the results meant to easily explain it to the class. He used stories from his past that really went along with his results of the PDP to really open our eyes to say that your results aren't bad, they are just explaining the things you need to work on.
01/29/2017
My favorite part of CEO this week was the business visit to Memorial Hospital. Florine Dixon has had many years of experience working at the hospital which helped her to share many wonderful stories with us. I was able to connect with Florine because I'm in the beginning stages of becoming an RN. Florine was able to thoroughly explain each department to give the students a bigger view of what each department does and how it's useful to the hospital. 01/22/2017
This week I found Brad Culpepper to be very interesting because he had many interesting stories about his earlier life that helped him get to where he is now. 01/15/2017
Some of the goals I wrote down were to keep building on the relationships I have made with the other students and with the fellow business leaders in Hancock County. 01/08/2017
This week in CEO was a week that we haven't experienced in a little while. We have all built a strong relationship with the other students well enough to trust each other's decisions and opinions in regards to the class business. We are making exceptional progress with our class business.
We took a break from the class business to speak with the owner of TNT Video Services. Michael was an excellent speaker and his work was exquisite. He told us that you need to be innovative and get to know yourself and to figure out what your skills are to find the right job for you.
12/18/2016
We visited Rock Creek Steel Supply in Ferris. Although I was skeptical about this visit, it turned out to be very interesting. We got to hear the story of 2 brothers who started a steel business. The biggest message they had to give us was to never be afraid to ask questions because someone out there is going to know the answer. If they don't, they will direct you to someone who does. 11/20/2016
This week in CEO was very productive. The T-shirt business was a huge success! Next week we will receive our mentors and I'm excited to see who I will get matched up with to help me succeed with my personal business. 11/13/2016
If I could give one word for this 10th week of CEO, I would give the word WOW! This week has been a huge success for our program and the projects we are working on. The t-shirts are ready to sell and we have been handed an amazing opportunity to get our name out there in the business world. This has also been a somewhat sad week because we have finished with our first home base at Memorial Medical Clinic. I personally loved it there because the scenery in the room was just like a business setting.
10/30/2016
I am really glad I decided to take this class because I never realized the skills that I was missing. I am now working on bettering myself as I move along in my career. 10/23/2016
I have taken this week as another week to keep building some great relationships with my classmates so we can work together and create a great class business. 10/16/2016
They (Sharpe Real Estate) taught us some valuable tips to take with us forward. One tip that stuck out was don't be afraid to put in work while in this program. Every aspect of this class is going to require you to put in some work, especially when we get to our class business. 10/09/2016
On Thursday we took a trip to Martin Sullivan and man was it a blast. We learned about making connections with customers to close a deal and how they use software to figure out what parts they have. We also had an accounting lesson on paying employees and to put icing on the cake we got to fly a drone and man was it fun! 09/08/2016