Success Stories
Client Success Stories
Teviya and Jon Abrahams rely on creativity. It’s the foundation of Jpixx, the creative video agency the couple spearheaded in Virginia Beach in 2013.
Jpixx started ten years ago when video had just become a necessary tool all the way down to the local level, so they did not need heavy sales to get going. However, when the COVID pandemic allowed for forced downtime, Teviya relied on her creative instincts and contacted the Hampton Roads SBDC.
“I reached out to the SBDC to build our business knowledge,” Teviya says. “We were experts in our field, but we learned about running a business as we went along.”
Dr. Bobbie Hansel-Union established Hansel Union Consulting, PLLC in 2010 to provide personal therapeutic services. After experiencing, and surviving, a brain aneurysm in her late 30s, Bobbie was convinced of the value of therapeutic services.
“After my experience, I realized it was only through therapy I was able to come back,” Bobbie says. Inspired by a desire to help others with developmental, intellectual and neurological disabilities, she opened her office in Portsmouth with a staff of one – herself. However, even though Bobbie embarked on her business venture on her own, she knew that didn’t mean she had to go about it alone.
“I was the only one on staff,” she says. “But I knew about the Hampton Roads SBDC, so I reached out to them for help.”
If you are looking for the face of the future, you will find it at Beach Baby Ultrasound. Run by ultrasound technologist-turned-business owner Karen Devlin, the Virginia Beach business introduces babies — complete with chubby cheeks and smiles — to parents and other family members before birth.
“This ultrasound studio is a happy environment,” Devlin says. “It’s very different from working as an ultrasound tech in the hospital where you’re looking for problems. At the Beach Baby studio, we focus on cute baby features.”
Beach Baby Ultrasound offers parents-to-be a large ultrasound room with ample space, a comfortable seating area and a large TV that provides 3D, 4D and 5D tracking of a baby’s development from seven to 30 weeks. That’s part of the peaceful, celebratory vibe Karen envisioned when she purchased the facility in December 2023.
“I had always wanted to be a business owner,” says Karen, whose pre-entrepreneurial career was as a licensed ultrasound technologist. “I thought it would be a great opportunity.”
As a founder and professional educator, Rhondnita Reed’s philosophy focuses on one core principle: relationships first.
“I believe in building relationships with kids,” she explains. “You know, they’re little humans. They need a safe space to be themselves while being held accountable. Our motto is ‘Rules without relationship will lead to rebellion.’” This approach, rooted in trust and guidance, is at the forefront of the Because I Care Educational Services (BICES) model, which began in August 2020 as a tutoring and homeschooling service dedicated to serving students’ individual needs.
While Rhondnita started her business with a clear vision, established clientele, and a gift for teaching, what she did not have was a business location to call her own.
Sandra Eduardo and daughter Ebony Vargas possess the qualifications and experience to operate an early childhood education center. They lacked a business plan that would allow expansion and growth. When Hampton Roads SBDC Advisor Bill Holloran joined the mother-daughter duo, a plan for growth took shape.
“My mother was an educator for 25 years and wanted to share her Hispanic culture and native tongue,” Ebony says, remembering A New World of Learning Bilingual Academy’s launch in January 2018. “I was in college and wanted to learn about being a business owner. During an SBDC-sponsored course for child care facilities, Bill was assigned to be our mentor.”
When the pandemic arrived in 2020, that educational course, as well as plans for expansion, were put on hold.
“When things opened up again, Bill reached out,” Ebony explains. “He was a phenomenal mentor and immediately helped us apply for relief grant funding.”