Following a successful trade show, Monroe County startUP recognized this year’s Entrepreneur of the Year, a young business owner with a key interest in helping people live their best healthy lives.

Soon to be a Columbia High School graduate, Ellie Schrubb presented Graceful Pantry at this year’s trade show, a business selling nutritious snacks and offering guidance on how folks can improve their diets.

While her trade show presentation placed an emphasis on the snack offerings, Schrubb explained she doesn’t have much interest in preparing food for customers and thus plans to have that be only a temporary part of the business.

Her biggest focus is simply helping people eat better, a passion inspired by her own struggles with digestive problems and seeing her grandfather tackle his type two diabetes through healthy eating.

“Eating healthy really changed my life, and I wanted to bring that into a business to help others,” Schrubb said. “Graceful Pantry in the future will be a nutrition consultation service, but for now I am making healthy recipes and sharing them on a blog as well as selling healthy snacks to help people stay on track.”

Schrubb noted how a tremendous number of people nowadays suffer from gastrointestinal issues, and these problems could be solved or lessened by cutting out some of the harmful additives found in many snack foods.

“There aren’t that many healthy brands at the grocery store,” Schrubb said. “There’s a bunch of additives in them, so I wanted to provide a clean option for people.”

She reiterated her interest in consultations as she described her plans for moving forward with Graceful Pantry.

When it comes to college, Schrubb said she intends to focus on real estate, studying nutrition as either a minor or second major as she turns her Graceful Pantry side job into a larger part of her life.

Beyond the trade show and her personal business, Schrubb also had plenty to say about her past year in startUP.

She explained that she was interested in the program as she hoped it would provide her the opportunity to better herself and develop some life skills.

Schrubb also had an interest in business ownership and the event-planning part of startUP thanks to her parents.

“I’ve always wanted to own my own business,” Schrubb said. “Both of my parents kind of work in events, and I knew the startUP program hosted events and everything. I wanted to learn more about that because I had no clue what was involved in running an event. Also just the leadership experience with it, working with a team.”

She certainly got to learn a great deal about leadership as she served as CEO in her class, organizing meetings among various other responsibilities.

“Definitely it took up more time than I expected it too, but it definitely prepared me, and I got the experience that I wanted through leading a team,” Schrubb said.

Schrubb also got plenty of event experience as this year’s class followed the example set by last year’s, organizing two major fundraisers to support the students’ individual businesses.

She recalled how the Boot Scoot into 2025 event was a bit haphazard, winding up a bit of a scramble as things came together at the last minuter, though the experience was ultimately quite positive when everything fell into place.

The more recent Glo Golf Tournament was a bit more positive. Schrubb noted how the event managed to sell out twice as the class made additional sign-up openings, with the event ultimately proving to be a major success.

“Our hard work definitely paid off because everyone said they had a great time and want to see it again in the future,” Schrubb said.

Schrubb had good things to say in general about her startUP experience, placing particular emphasis on all of the things she learned outside of the classroom from the tours her class went on and the speakers they heard from throughout the year.

The opportunity to make connections with business owners and others in the county were hugely important to her, and she said she would encourage any future startUP students to make good use of the mentorship that those guest speakers can provide.

“A huge benefit is meeting those in the community and business owners, hearing from their experience, because you’re really able to see it from their perspective,” Schrubb said. “They’re able to mentor you.”

With the startUP school year coming to a close, Monroe County startUP Board Chair George Obernagel remarked on the past year as he’s seen the students grow as young entrepreneurs.

He especially praised Schrubb as she earned the distinction of Entrepreneur of the Year.

“I think she did a great job on her individual business,” Obernagel said. “It was something different… And at the trade show, her display was very beautiful. She had samples that you wanted to take and product if you wanted to order.”

Obernagel was also generally positive about the class as a whole, pointing to the strong presentations at the trade show as well as their hard work putting together the fundraising events as a group.

“I think we had a great group of students this year. They worked very well together,” Obernagel said. “The Glo Golf Tournament, that was very good, and the line dancing was another great success. It took a lot of work from these individuals to work together as a team.”

For more information on Monroe County startUP, visit monroecountystartup.com.