Entrepreneurs who attended the ceremony at Atlanta’s expansive Cobb County Ballroom wore tuxedos, gowns, suits and brightly colored outfits. One woman looked like a glam pirate, wearing an eyepatch with a glittering skull and crossbones.
Some rolled around in wheelchairs, relied on canes, and others wore night clothes to display feeding tubes.
They came from all over the country at the invitation of a Georgia-based nonprofit organization. They had more in common than building a business from scratch. That means everyone has a disability.
“Being an entrepreneur is hard,” 38-year-old Alvaro Silverstein said after being pushed onto the stage by his business co-founder. “You need to overcome challenges. You need resilience. And I think people with disabilities have lived that way all our lives.”
When he was 18 years old, he was involved in a traffic accident and became paralyzed from the waist down. Although he can’t walk or control his fingers, he earned an MBA. And with his friend Camilo Navarro, he founded Wheel the World, a site that helps people with disabilities book travel that meets their specific accessibility needs, from hotels to activities. Collected dollars.
The idea arose from Silverstein’s struggles in planning his own trip to Patagonia’s national parks. Silverstein, who lives in Berkeley, Calif., said the five-year-old company currently has 45 staff, supports about 6,000 travel reservations, and expects to be cash flow positive next year. It is said that there is.
“I’m lucky to have this job,” he said. “I love what I do. I love the problems we’re solving.”
additional hurdles
People with disabilities can face additional hurdles beyond the already daunting task of starting a business and trying to grow it into a profitable business. The work often leads to grueling working hours.
Jacqueline Child, who has a number of chronic illnesses, said she regularly suffers from physical pain and extreme fatigue.
Child, who lives in Denver, launched a dating app for the disabled and chronically ill community. She endured more than 40 surgeries due to her illness, she said. She was dependent on her feeding tube and had to build her business around her frequent medical visits and need for naps during the day.
In the fall of 2022, she and her sister Alexa Child created Dateability, which they say currently has about 20,000 users.
“I’m very proud of myself,” Child said. “Not to find a boyfriend, because frankly I haven’t found that, but to find purpose,” she told attendees.
The awards ceremony, held in front of a crowd of about 200 people, was hosted by Synergy Work, a nonprofit that connects founders with disabilities with resources, mentors and other supporters.
The winners of the second annual EDDIE Awards (which stands for Entrepreneurs for Diversity and Inclusive Excellence) are selected by a panel of judges and will be chosen by a panel of judges to encourage people, whether they have worked at Synergies Work or not. Awarded. The organization’s founder, Aarti Sagar, told the audience that the award was given to bold and daring people “who are not afraid to break down doors, and who are actually not afraid to break down doors.” He said it was designed to.
Top prize winners
Mr. Silverstein won the grand prize for Entrepreneur of the Year, with a cash prize of $10,000. The child won the Newcomer Award.
The event was attended by a large number of disabled performers, presenters and award finalists. Dan Parker of Columbus, Ohio, is a former drag racer who was permanently blinded in an accident, went on to set a world record for blind driving (211.043 mph), and now makes handmade pens. Derek Heard, a graphic artist from Albany, said his business, Derek’s Doodles, “empowers my voice.” He received an award for creativity.
social impact
When social impact award recipient Ruby “Sunshine” Taylor, 46, took to the stage, she addressed her parents in the audience, including her soon-to-be 86-year-old mother. “This is for you, baby.”
Taylor started Financial Joy School, a gaming and educational platform that provides financial education. She was a school social worker for many years. She then suffered a traumatic brain injury in a car accident. For a long time, she didn’t know who her mother was because of it. She couldn’t laugh or smile. She couldn’t hold a fork.
Rehabilitation gradually helped her over the years, as did the financial and investment education she received from the parents of her former students. Now, her smile is contagious, and she wants to spread the word through the business she’s been running for four years.
Taylor said her therapist told her she could no longer work a regular 9-to-5 job because of her injuries. She takes naps, struggles with headaches, and can only focus on one thing at a time, or forgets what she’s doing. She said, “My short-term memory is garbage.”
She has to restrain herself from working no more than 30 hours a week, and often less. She said her disability “limited my speed, but not my mind.”
