unleashing
national impact
igniting local
transformation
Valparaiso native Jamie Fankhauser began her career in nursing, but always knew she was meant to make soap. When her daughter was diagnosed with Hashimoto's disease, Fankhauser started making homemade goats' milk soap in order to help her skin. "I started passing out bars of soap and a shop owner in Valpo heard about me," she says. "It's hard to find someone who makes soap the old fashioned, cold-pressed way, so she reached out and wanted to display my products."
" . . . I want to continue to grow the community for those faces that I've met who have already made such an impact on me."
Originally working out of her kitchen, in 2018 Fankhauser opened her first storefront in downtown Valpo. BUN's Soapbox products can also be found on Etsy, in local natural grocery stores, and under private labels. Out of the eleven current BUN's Soapbox employees, eight of them have autism. Fankhauser is passionate about employing autistic adults, and because of this mission, the business caught the attention of major retailer, Meijer. "Having a family member with autism, I thought it was important for them to be employed," she says. "Once the community found out, people started asking if I would hire their son or daughter."
While Fankhauser uses a local farmer for her goats' milk, she grew up on a farm and hopes to eventually repurchase the 40 acres of land her grandparents once owned to raise her own goats. She is opening a location in a local Meijer this year, with the eventual goal of having all 255 national stores carry her products. By growing and expanding the company even further, her ultimate objective is to employ more autistic adults. "I'm content," she says. "But I want to continue to grow the community for those faces that I've met who have already made such an impact on me."
Like many nurses, Jean Ross wants to help people. And while she's quick to share how impressive the healthcare system is, she acknowledges that it can feel a bit like "a human factory." Now, through her work with Primary Record, Ross finds herself in a completely new role. She says, "It's amazing to be on this side, impacting patient care in a different way. And I selfishly, too, am also trying to help my nursing colleagues because we're often the band-aid and the plugger holes of that dam that's bursting because we have to go find the data when the families don't."
"I know other female nurse founders that are in California, and it feels so cutthroat out there. Here I feel so supported. I know I'm very lucky."
Built for patients and families in medically complex situations, Primary Record is a platform designed to simplify health information. The initial idea started as a network of nine nurses in February 2020 that Ross intended to grow into a care coordination business in Fishers. One month later, the Covid-19 pandemic upended Ross's plans, but rather than give up, she talked to her neighbor Jim McIntosh. Ross laughs as she says, "The story goes that I walked across the street to talk to Jim because I knew he was in tech—to be totally honest I didn't know what he did. But I laid the whole idea out for him. And the rest is history." McIntosh joined with Ross, and together they found support through Indiana Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and that led to an improved proof of concept and an Indiana Technical Assistance Program (INTAP) grant, which helped offset their combined out-of-pocket expenses. In 2023 they started to pursue VC funding and upward of $1.3 million has been invested to date.
When it comes to building a startup, Ross couldn't be more enthusiastic about Indiana. She says, "I know other female nurse founders that are in California, and it feels so cutthroat out there. Here I feel so supported. I know I'm very lucky." Ross has found additional support in Indiana through the Startup Ladies and the Axis mentor program. The challenge of the startup landscape energizes Ross, but it's the end user that keeps her focused. "I'll never forget talking to a woman whose parents were Korean. When we showed her how she could put information in there and her mom could translate it into their language to understand her health, she started crying," Ross says and pauses to collect herself. "I'm going to get emotional talking about it. But just showing her that her mom gets to ask questions in her own language. The dignity of that."
Vicente Garza migrated to East Chicago from Monterrey in 1925 to pursue the American Dream with little more than a handful of family recipes in his pocket. El Popular, the packaged food company he founded, is still in operation today, making it the oldest continuously run Mexican business in the United States.
"People often ask what the secret to our longevity is. It's two things. First, the product formulation and quality. Second, it's the way we treat our customers, employees and suppliers like they're part of the family. There's a lot to be said for that, and the fact that we've survived for this long means we must be doing something right."
Along with his father, several uncles and other family members, current third-generation owner Edward Garza has been part of the business for as long as he can remember. "I have a bachelor's degree in business administration from Indiana State University and a master's degree, but everything I've done outside of that has been with El Popular," he says. At one time, the company maintained a grocery selection of 400 to 500 products. When Garza took ownership in 2002, he streamlined operations by narrowing down the inventory to a handful of signature items (chorizo and longaniza sausages, molé powders and pastes, Mexican chocolate, spices and seasoning mixes) and shifted the focus to expanding distribution. "You can have a great product, but if you can't get it in front of buyers and into the hands of customers, you won't make it. That's why distribution is so important," he explains. "I always wanted us to be a national company. We now reach into about forty states and Canada and are exploring other international opportunities for our next generation of growth."
Under Garza's leadership, El Popular has swelled its food service and private-label customer bases, and the sausage line has evolved from mild and spicy options into new flavor profiles and a plant-based product. "We built our own USDA meat plant and went from making around 200,000 to 250,000 pounds of product a year to almost 2.5 million pounds," he adds. Garza is grateful for the support he's received from the Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC), the Northwest Indiana Small Business Development Center (SBDC), and the Purdue University Manufacturing Extension Partnership. He looks forward to continuing collaboration with these organizations to take El Popular into its next century. "People often ask what the secret to our longevity is," Garza says. "It's two things. First, the product formulation and quality. Second, it's the way we treat our customers, employees and suppliers like they're part of the family. There's a lot to be said for that, and the fact that we've survived for this long means we must be doing something right."