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Last November, we announced the GOOD Maker Growing Side of Business challenge, which called upon the small businesses in the GOOD community to tell us how they'd want to grow or expand. We received a ton of great submissions and we are pleased to announce the winner of the $10,000 grant as Borough Furnace of Syracuse, New York.
Borough Furnace is an iron foundry on a journey to be part of sustainable, small-scale American manufacturing. It currently manufactures kitchenware with a zero waste production model, sourcing materials from local waste streams and powering the furnace with post-consumer vegetable oil. Owner John Truex says, "We'll use the money to develop a new product—kitchen and coat hooks. Product development includes prototyping the units, making mold patterns, and fabricating flasks for the sand molds."
This addition to the company's product line up, which currently includes two skillets and a bottle opener, will open new markets for Borough Furnace. "A lower price point product line will help us reach a wider audience and allow us to be carried in stores that aren't specifically kitchen-related. Additional income from this product will help support the rest of the business as we continue to develop and improve our sustainable production line," says Truex. The company plans to begin rolling out the kitchen and coat hooks in spring of this year.
Still a fledgling business, Truex says, "All of our start-up funding initially came from a Kickstarter campaign, where customers pledged support for our new production system in exchange for bottle opener and skillet preorders." But winning the Growing Side of Business challenge is, for Truex, "Very exciting and such a great opportunity."
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