By T. Scott Boatright
Ruston Mayor Ronny Walker and others got down to the business of, well, talking about new businesses Thursday night as they held an entrepreneurial Q&A session at the old Historic Fire Station.
Billed as “Dream it! Do it! Ruston!,” the program included Planning and Zoning Director Jim Hays, Public Works Director John Freeman and Main Street Director Lauren Dowden discussing the potential of realizing the dream of opening a business in the city.
“The whole purpose of this is for us just to have a conversation,” Walker said as he started the discussion. “I was literally getting my hair cut one day and two or three of the barbers in there were saying we want to do this or we want to do that, just asking questions, and I realized we just need to have a meeting where people could come and talk, ask questions and see what we could do. That’s what this is all about.”
There was no meeting agenda. Walker said the purpose of the event was simply a chance to talk.
“From the city’s standpoint, we would love to have more businesses start in our city,” Walker said. “I go to other cities all the time — I try to go to cities about our size — and there’s a couple of things different about Ruston and those other cities. One, our downtown is full. We have three empty spaces, I think, and two of those are already rented but haven’t opened yet. So we don’t have much available downtown, but we would still love to have some businesses start and locate downtown. Now most of the other cities I go to have lots of vacant spots and therefore their rent is super cheap because there’s not as much demand.”
“But the other thing is because of all the work on our infrastructure the past 11 years, we’re ready for more businesses. Whether you’re big or small, we’re ready for you. But also, what most people forget about, is that in 2024, the Sports Complex brought more than half a million visitors to Ruston, and 400,000 of those were on weekends early. Those are people coming from out of town, which plays right into small businesses in our city.”
Kathy Wyatt, executive director of Louisiana Tech’s Enterprise Center, was also on hand to explain what the university might have to offer in bringing new businesses to Ruston.
“Louisiana Tech has a tremendous amount of resources that are supporting and helpful in starting up new businesses,” Wyatt said. “Our division of the university focuses on higher growth businesses, the kind of businesses that can become more powerful when they get aligned with the university. We try to help businesses engage in ways that produce bottom lines for lots of people.
“Obviously the business owners, and the customers that are involved, but if we’re involving you with the university, we’re also finding a way to either make a meaningful experience for a student that might get engaged with your business some way like an internship or employment opportunity, but also we can connect you with a faculty member that might have expertise in the area you’re working in, that faculty member might could serve as an advisor or a consultant that could collaborate on a research project to help a business grow into something that wasn’t even imagined before.
Wyatt said the Enterprise Center can also try to help businesses think broader than just the local market — to find ways to go get dollars outside of Ruston and bring them back to Lincoln Parish and grow the local economy even more.
Hays and Freeman discussed the importance of knowing the basics and the importance of making sure to consider and research all things necessary to successfully start a new business, from zoning considerations all the way down to making sure all utilities are available down to fiber optic internet services.
Dionna Mitchell Leblanc, who has started an LLC called Learning Loft she is opening off of Highway 80 on the west side of the city to provide tutoring for area schoolchildren, was one of those on hand to find out more about the ins and outs of starting a new business in Ruston.
“We’re getting the building ready now, but because I’m in education, it will start as an afterschool thing until it can be a fulltime situation,” Mitchell said. “Currently, I’m seeing so many people who need a place to go to do their tutoring. And not only that, I’ll have a parent lounge where a parent can sit there in a very spacious area and if they have other children, they can bring them without the worry of them being too loud
“On the weekends we’ll do Mommy and Me classes. The socialization of not only kids, but also parents, is a big deal and I know that in Ruston, as a mom and as a teacher, I would love to see more things for younger kids and toddlers. To have a space where we can all get together and bond not only with our children, but with each other, it’s going to be a community-based educational kind of space that will have a big outdoor space and can expand to birthday parties on the weekend and that kind of thing.”
Walker stressed the importance of making sure a business plan is in place before getting underway and that the city will try to make it as easy as possible for any new entrepreneur to get started.
“You’ve never too young or old to start,” Walker said. “Yes, you’ll have ups and downs, but you just have to do your research, talk to others about the financial considerations and those kinds of things.
“So I would encourage you first if you have a product or something you want to do, map it out, write it out. It’s important to know the direction you want to go. But from a city standpoint, we will try to make it as easy as possible for any new business that wants to get started.”
