The Honors Project in Business Administration course at The University of Akron (UA) College of Business (CoB), conducted September 2021 through May 2022, involved partnership with the local nonprofit Goodwill Industries of Akron (GIA) at the direction of Interim Dean of the CoB, Dr. Susan Hanlon. The purpose of this capstone project was to generate ideas and recommendations to GIA for a new, sustainable business unit, the revenue of which would cover the annual $250,000 operating cost of a new transportation support initiative to overcome GIA’s clients’ barriers to employment. During the secondary research phase of this project undertaken from September 2021 through December 2021, three options for a new business unit were explored: a childcare center business unit; a vocational services and training business unit; and a curated pop-up shop business unit. Ultimately, the latter-most option was chosen as the focus for primary research, as GIA already has high brand recognition for resale goods in the eyes of consumers and operational experience in clothing and accessory sales that they could capitalize on to target a key demographic willing to spend additional monies (found to be called the “creativist” thrift shopper) to sustain a profitable business unit. In this publication, authors Morgan Andrews, Casey Bachowski, Caitlin Croston, Zach Dunphy, and Weston Latham (“Contributor Consultants”) discuss the primary research process which led to arriving at the recommendation that GIA implement a Pop-Up Thrift Shop business unit to increase revenues
