Local competition helps jumpstart new businesses in Livingston County

Spectrum News 1

Livingston County Economic Development is bringing back a competition it started in 2019 to attract new businesses to one of the county’s nine villages. Although the new winners will be announced on July 14, the contest has already made an impact. Ruth Ann Lewis is preparing cinnamon rolls at Sweet Arts Bakery in downtown Geneseo.

“It’s turned into our signature product,” Lewis said. “Somebody said the best thing about the pandemic is sweet arts bakery delivers their cinnamon rolls. That was kind of a compliment.”

She owns the business with her husband, Brian. They actually got their start in the village of Avon, but wanted to expand to Geneseo after consistently selling out at their farmer’s markets. The two needed help to get there. Fortunately for them, Livingston County Economic Development began a new competition called Dream-O-Vate in 2019 that aimed to attract new businesses to their downtowns.

“We got wonderful information from different people in the business world from all the different groups then we had to write a final business plan of what we wanted it look like,” Brian said. “And fortunately we were one of the folks to be the finalist.”