What's Happening at iBec?
11.13.08
WORKSHOP: Image Savvy Business Strategy
When? November 13, 2008 from 11:30-1pm
Where? Wishcamper Center, University of Southern Maine
What? What you need to know about a marketing strategy, web design, graphic design or photography to position your business for success
Who should attend? Business owners of companies looking for a fresh perspective on their marketing.
Sign up! Cost is $20 which includes a catered lunch and parking. Online registrating starting October 27th.
10.8.08
iBec Speaks at USM Corporate Parnters Breakfast
Former participants in the USM School of Business Student Business Plan Competition will share their stories of how the competition helped launch their businesses, where they are today, and what the future holds for them.
9.24.08
Becky Speaks to USM Students on Starting a Business as a Young Entrepreneur
iBec Creative founder, Becky Stockbridge, joined Fred Aiello's Entrepreneurial Studies class at the University of Southern Maine to share her story on starting a business two and half years ago after graduating from USM. When one student asked, "Was there any advice that you received that helped you starting your business?" Stockbridge replied, "I remember someone once told me that, 'Sucessful people do the things that unsucessful people do not want to do," and that advice has always stuck in my mind. Right now it is a competitive field in the graphic and web design industry and if you are not willing to go the extra mile and always strive to be the best, you will quickly lose your competitive edge."
8.18.08
iBec Welcomes Jacquie Driscoll as a Designer
Jacquie Driscoll joins iBec as a designer! Check out his portfolio website here.
5.20.08
iBec Speaks on starting a Business as a Young Entrepreneur with PROPEL
Becky Stockbridge, founder of iBec Creative, was a guest speaker at PROPEL's Lunch and Learn series on starting a business in Maine as a young entrepreneur. PROPEL is a division of the Portland Chamber of Commerce for young professionals. Other speakers in the series were Ben Shaw, founder of FetchDog and Travis Holland, Co-Founder TOEGOZ, Inc.
4.7.08
iBec Speaks on the Creative Economy
Early April of 2008 Becky spoke at the University of Southern Maine to a group of delegates from Northern Ireland who were visiting Maine to learn more about Maine's Creative Economy. As a USM graduate, Becky spoke on how the University played a role in the successful launch of iBec in the Creative Economy. Becky was joined by Doug Green of Green Design and Cindy Thompson of Transformit.
2.28.08
National Entrepreneurship Week - iBec Speaks at Maine Center for
Enterprise Development
Becky Stockbridge, founder of iBec Creative, joined Heather Chandler of the SunriseGuide to talk about their experience launching their business at Maine Center for Enterprise Development, a business incubator in Portland, Maine, to high school students participating in National Entrepreneurship Week."Starting my business in the incubator played a huge role in the successful launch of my company. Having a dedicated place to work everyday and the collaboration with other entrepreneurs was an invaluable experience," Stockbridge says.
2.14.08
iBec Speaks to USM Students on Challenges and Triumphs of Growing a Company as a Young Entrepreneur
Thursday afternoon, Becky Stockbridge shared her experience of growing a web design company for the past 2 years in Portland, Maine to Fred Aiello's class, Managing the Growing Entrepreneur. Aiello was a mentor to Stockbridge while she was writing her business plan for MediCreative, a web and graphic design company targeted to the medical community, which eventually evolved into iBec Creative. "The most challenging part now is finding the right people to bring into the company that share the same passion for design and commitment to excellence as I do," Stockbridge says. "From the beginning, I think working collaboratively with clients and a team attitude has helped me get to where I am now."
2.5.08
iBec Speaks to Youth at Long Creek Youth Development Center
Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE), a University of Southern Maine student group, has developed an entrepreneurial series at Long Creek Youth Development Center to educate youth about what it is like to start a business. Stockbridge visited the group and spoke about why she decided to start her own web design company and what the experience has been as a young entrepreneur.
2.1.08
DownEast Magazine: The University of Southern Maine Offers Endless Possibilities in Maine’s Largest City
Our interconnected campuses in Portland and nearby Gorham let you jump into the energy of a teaming port city full of shopping, art, music, dining and career-building opportunities. Rebecca Stockbridge, an '06 graduate from our unique Art and Entrepreneurial Studies program, never returned to her home state of Massachusetts, preferring to open her own Web and graphic design businesses - IbecCreative and MediCreative - in downtown Portland. Crediting the advice and mentoring her art and business professors gave her, this 26-year-old says of her early success that, "It sort of all snowballed, and the snowball stared at USM." Read More »
11.14.07
USM News Release:
USM Student Business Plan Competition Finalist Sets Up Shop in Portland
When Maine policymakers talk about the need to reverse the brain drain by training and retaining an educated work force, they’d be hard pressed to find a better example than Rebecca Stockbridge’s experience at USM and in the Maine Center for Enterprise Development. Stockbridge, a 24-year-old USM graduate from Scituate, Mass., runs two Web design businesses out of a Congress Street office and just bought her first house – not bad for someone who received her bachelor’s degree in 2006.
Stockbridge transferred to USM after searching for a college where she could combine her artistic talents with a business education. She chose USM for what she described as its “unique” Art and Entrepreneurial Studies degree—a program that requires art students to take classes in USM’s School of Business and intern in an art-related business. Associate Professor of Art Jan Piribeck, Stockbridge’s academic advisor, feels that “USM can be a catalyst for the creative economy through working with and encouraging students like Becky, who is a perfect example of a creative thinker who can apply herself in a practical way – embodying the kind of person who can succeed in Maine.”
Associate Professor of Business Administration Frederic Aiello urged Stockbridge to submit a business plan she wrote as a class assignment to USM’s Student Business Plan Competition and to the Libra Future Fund, a fund that awards grants to entrepreneurs ages 18-29. The plan was for MediCreative, a graphic and Web design company that works with members of the health care industry creating Web sites for their businesses.
And the rest, as they say, is history. Stockbridge received the Libra grant, and although she didn’t win the competition, her plan did place in the top five, which garnered her a rent-free year in the Maine Center for Enterprise Development (MCED) a business incubator housed at USM. (For background information on the Maine Center for Enterprise Development, see http://www.usm.maine.edu/mcr/news/releases_0506/mced.htm and http://www.mced.biz/about.html.)
MCED President John Ferland says Stockbridge progressed rapidly in a short period of time, exiting the incubator with a company that had customers and revenue that provided her with a living.
Today, she has spun off another graphic and Web design company, iBec Creative, to serve a growing client base that is not in the medical field. She has no plan to leave Portland; a city that she loves and feels has offered her opportunities that larger cities could not – a small, supportive business community. Stockbridge credits Pirabeck and Aiello for nurturing and supporting her career aspirations. She says of her early success that “it sort of all snowballed, and the snowball started at USM.”
11.13.07
iBec Graduates from Maine Center for Enterprise Development
iBec's subsidiary company, MediCreative, was launched at Maine Center for Enterprise Development, a business incubator, in May of 2006. A year and a half later we are celebrating our graduation and successful start up!
iBec Creative and MediCreative founder, Becky Stockbridge (center) celebrates with fellow graduates Mike Leathem and Zach Conover of CrossRate Technology, and Joel Glatz and Brad Taylor of Frontier Energy.
10.30.07
iBec Creative Featured in November's issue of PortCity Life.
iBec Creative's founder, Becky Stockbridge, is highlighted in PortCity Life's November article, "Twenty is Plenty." Becky comments on her experience starting a business in Maine as a young entrepreneur and her plans for the future.
10.26.07
Office Warming Party
Friday 5-7pm 306 Congress Street. Join us with Sullivan Multi Family Realty, MacBride Management and Level 8 Design Studio and celebrate our new space with us! Refreshments, appetizers and networking.
9.4.07
iBec Creative Opens Its Doors at 306 Congress Street, Portland Maine
It is an exciting step for iBec Creative, we have officially moved out of the business incubator, Maine Center for Enterprise Development, and have a beautiful new space on Congress Street. Come by and see the new place! We have joined the office building shared by Sullivan Multi Family Realty, MacBride Management and Infinite Artworks. |
