There's a large military presence in the Lithia area, especially in Fishhawk, and we found one man who is hoping to help veterans transition to entrepreneurship.
Daryl Hych spent years in the Navy and years finding his role as an entrepreneur.
Today, one of the many things he does is publish a magazine called Tampa Pioneer. It highlights entrepreneurs across Tampa Bay, and their successes and failures.
"Since we moved here to Tampa and started realizing that Tampa was hot for entrepreneurs, but no one was talking about it. So we designed a magazine called Tampa Pioneer, where we go around, and we interview Tampa's entrepreneurs, and we put their stories out just the way they want to tell it. If you want to tell us about how you failed, or how you succeeded, we're going to tell the story the way you want to be told. So that's been our latest project. And we've been excited to be able to talk to the many entrepreneurs and people who are interested in entrepreneurship here in the Tampa market," said Daryl Hych, President of the Switzer Hych Group.
He also has a program called Uniform to Suits that walks transitioning military members through the process of starting their own business.
Hych said "Or those employees don't fully understand everything that veteran brings to the to their organization or to their market. So entrepreneurship was an opportunity to say, you know what, I can create my own value. I believe that our service members have everything it takes to be an entrepreneur and not only just an entrepreneur but a successful entrepreneur. "
"Our entrepreneurs are the basis of the American dream. You know, we stimulate the economy, that's what an entrepreneur does. And so why I got chosen to stand in this gap. I don't know. But you know, I can tell you that during this COVID transition, more entrepreneurs were founded and started than any other time in history, because people were frustrated, they had to figure out a way to look at the mask that came out. So I think that, you know, entrepreneurship is the greatest thing. It's the greatest drug you can ever take," said Hych.
Hych also has two other programs that focus on helping kids.
One is called Yes-U and it helps kids prepare for pitch competitions.
You can read about the magazine and his programs to help entrepreneurs by clicking here.
