Chamber Expo showcases area businesses

Yadkin County Chamber of Commerce’s fourth annual Showcase Yadkin business expo was held Friday at the Yadkin County Agricultural and Educational Building.

“Showcase Yadkin Business Expo is a wonderful opportunity for Chamber members to showcase their latest products and services to other Chamber members and to the community, said Jamie Johnston, of the Yadkin Chamber.

This year’s showcase included around 25 vendors representing industries such as healthcare, finance, real estate, nonprofits and more.

In addition to business professionals who visited the expo, area students had a chance to browse the showcase as well. High schoolers from Forbush, Starmount and the Yadkin Early College were able to visit with vendors at the expo.

Yadkin Early College teacher Blake Johnson, recently named teacher of the year at this school, said the event was a great experience for his students.

“One of the classes I’m teaching right now is an economics and personal finance class. It’s economics but also basics like’ how do you get a job’, ‘what do you do with benefits, ‘how do you retire.’ Our unit right now is career fair and resumes so this fits right in,” Johnson said.

Johnson has high school juniors in that class and he said Friday’s business expo was a good way for students to learn more about different career options. Learning to be personable and not so shy by stopping at each booth and talking to people was good experience for them as well, he said.

There were around 400 guests at this year’s expo, Johnston said. She said it was great exposure for Chamber members and she heard multiple comments from attendees that they hadn’t known about some of the businesses prior to the expo.

The event, Johnston said, is really to bring awareness to the community of the businesses and agencies that serve the county.