Photo courtesy of Eli Jarrell (middle)
Naperville Central High School senior Eli Jarrell learned about INCubatoredu from his soccer teammate.
“I play soccer, so one of my older teammates was in the class when I was a freshman, told me about it, and it sounded really cool,” Jarrel said. “You had the freedom to kind of do what you want and guide yourself through your own company, which I thought was really cool.”
After hearing about the course he decided to enroll, still not really knowing what it all entailed.
“For me, INCubator seemed like a cool class. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was when I went into it, but after going through the process I really enjoyed it,” Jarrell shared.
Last year Jarrell’s curiosity took him all the way to Pitch Night, a Shark Tank style pitch event, with his INCubatoredu team, Hook Nook. After a successful INCubatoredu experience, he decided he wanted to continue on the entrepreneurial course pathway with ACCELeratoredu.
In ACCELeratoredu, Jarrell is now CEO of his new company, GOATed Headcovers. The company sells golf headcovers of goats dressed as different professional athletes.
“It’s a goat head cover, like the animal, and then we dress it up as different GOATS [Greatest of All Time], like professional athletes,” Jarrell explained. “We have a Lionel Messi one, we’re working on a Tom Brady one and we did Tiger Woods.”
Jarrell’s experiences in INCubatoredu and ACCELeratoredu allowed him to develop necessary skills over the past two years that he doesn’t just use in the classroom. His experiences in the courses have also helped him build and scale his own business as a barber.
“I use a lot of the website and social media stuff we learned to draw in more clients,” Jarrell shared. “It’s been a huge help in all that.”
INCubator and ACCELerator students also gain a host of other skills, including communication, presenting, selling and logistics.
“You’re constantly giving these 10 minute long presentations in front of your class,” Jarrell said. “It’s kind of nerve-wracking going up to it, but once you’ve been in that position before, you find it more comfortable to do it again. And then taking that into our speech class in English, it’s nothing going up and talking in front of your class.”
One of the most rewarding aspects of the INCubator and ACCELerator programs for Jarrell is turning an idea into something tangible.
“Building a website, actually getting a product in hand– going from your imagination, to your mockups, to actually seeing it come to life is something that’s really encouraging,” Jarrell added.
For Jarrell, the most exciting part of the past two years in INCubator and ACCELerator has been seeing what his classmates created.
“What I’ve enjoyed the most is being in the classroom. We each have our own TV, and we can look around and see all the other groups,” Jarrell shared. “Everyone is doing something completely different, and it’s really cool to see how we’re all in the same class, but we’re all taking completely different routes with the prompts.”
As the end of ACCELerator and Jarrell’s graduation date approaches, he and his team have to decide the future of GOATed Headcovers.
“We’re going to have to decide what to do,” Jarrell said. “We could pass it on, we could continue to do it ourselves in college, or we could even continue as a mentor and pass it down, and we can still have kind of a control of the company.”
Jarrell’s team is waiting to decide what they want to do until they can see how much success the business has this semester.
“If we’re able to get a cheap version of all these jerseys the way we want them to look, then I think we’ll definitely continue it and see where it can take us,” he said.
While the company’s future is still up in the air, Jarrell got more out of his INCubator and ACCELerator experience than just business skills.
“It helps you build these new friendships,” Jarrell shared. “My Hook Nook guys that I worked with last year, I’m still friends with them and we’ll still talk about Hook Nook even though it’s discontinued.”
Jarrell even developed a close relationship with Mr. Neubauer, the NCHS INCubator and ACCELerator teacher.
“Mr. Neubauer will always be one of my favorite teachers,” Jarrell said. “He wrote my letter of recommendation for college. All these connections with your mentor, your teacher, your classmates, they all go beyond the class.”
