New entrepreneurial facility opens in Midlands

By Mike Switzer

Published September 8, 2023 at 5:56 AM EDT

The start-up community in our capital city recently gained a new resource when our next guest’s nonprofit organization opened up their new facility which is providing co-working and networking opportunities and more thanks to some outside funding that they were able to attain last year. Mike Switzer interviews Caroline Crowder, executive director of GrowCo in Columbia, SC.

Tags

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.

See stories by Mike Switzer