Twenty Central Michigan University students will each have five minutes Thursday to present an entrepreneurial idea for a chance to win $500.

Make a Pitch, a contest run by CMU’s LaBelle Entrepreneurial Center, is a part of the College of Business Administration, will be held at 5 p.m. Thursday in Grawn Hall Room 100.

Associate Director of LEC and a previous judge for the event, Charles Burke said accounting professor James Damitio came up with the event to help students from all academic areas come up with and discuss new ideas.

“This is his baby,” Burke said.

Make a Pitch is held twice each semester, and the 20 participants are usually watched by an audience of up to 50 people, he said.

“For everyone presenting, we usually have someone curious, or a friend (attending),” Burke said.

Guidelines for presentations describe the areas judges will be focusing on, such as target customers and the enterprise’s competitor. Presentations may also explain manufacturing method, distribution, sales and marketing, overhead and profits, though participants are warned they will not have enough time to fully address each topic.

“The concept is an elevator pitch,” Burke said.

He said an elevator pitch is selling an idea to a person in the time it would take to ride an elevator.

Livonia junior Emily Turbiak said participating in Make A Pitch helps students become more proficient at public speaking. Turbiak won first place in March with a designer handbag idea.

“It was very nerve-racking,” Turbiak said.

However, she said the experience gave her confidence with public speaking, and that after the contest it became easier to give the presentation.

Burke said participants are not allowed to use props in their presentation in an effort to help the contest move from presentation to presentation, and to keep it fair for enterprises that do not have options for interesting props.

Turbiak said she had notecards to help her during her presentation, but she found it was easier to simply glance at them.

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E-mail the author: Jonathan Kleyer