SC Entrepreneurial Resources Keep Growing

By Mike Switzer

Published October 19, 2018 at 5:01 AM EDT

University-attached business incubators are an important part of our state’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. About a year ago, another one opened for business, this time at a faith-based institution in the Midlands.

Mike Switzer interviews Scott Adams, dean of the Business School at Columbia International University, home of the new John R. Cook Jr. Business & Entrepreneurship Center.

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Mike Switzer

After almost 20 years, Mike Switzer retired from Wells Fargo Securities in 2001 as Senior Vice President/Investment Officer and Certified Portfolio Manager. In 1999, he and his wife, Maggie, purchased and operated for eight years the Baskin Robbins ice cream store on Forest Drive in Columbia. They grew the store from a bottom-tier operation in the Baskin Robbins franchise system to one in the top 5% nationwide within three years, tripling sales along the way. While operating the ice cream store, Mike and Maggie received patents for a portable ice cream sink and fold-down sneezeguard they invented and in 2002 started Magnolia Carts, an ice cream cart manufacturing company, which they sold in 2013.

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