With one Twin Cities Startup Week under her belt as executive director of Beta, the Twin Cities’ startup advocacy group, Shelisa Demuth is thinking bigger: more corporate partnerships. More investors…
The TCB 100 - 2023
Meet the business leaders, trailblazers, and newsmakers poised to make an
impression in 2023.
Every summer, the editors of TCB sit down and make a list. A list of the people in and around Minnesota business likely to make news and drive change in the year ahead. Then we cut the list down to 100, and that’s no easy task, because this list includes not just business, but also government and philanthropic worlds that intersect with business. We like to think of the TCB 100 as the proverbial “little black book” of key people to watch in our coverage area. So sit back, share in the success of some old friends, and get to know some new ones. —Adam Platt
By Liz Fedor, Allison Kaplan, Winter Keefer, Stephanie March, Tina Nguyen, Dan Niepow, Adam Platt, and Gene Rebeck.
When WCCO-TV fixture Jason DeRusha walked away from a stable career anchoring morning TV news to move to an “old” medium, AM radio, many wondered if too many 3 a.m.…
“Effective, efficient, and fun” is the tagline of CAMP Digital, an Edina-based digital marketing company that Katie Donovan co-founded in 2018 for the home improvement trades. While these services have…
These days, there are numerous solar panel installers. Minnetonka-headquartered Blue Horizon Energy takes a broader approach to renewable energy by helping each business client meet “a financial objective, a carbon-based…
After serving 19 years on the University of St. Thomas faculty, Laura Dunham was selected in May to become dean of the Opus College of Business. For the past five…
After serving as director of social justice advocacy with Catholic Charities, Acooa Ellis joined United Way in 2018. As a nonprofit community leader, she emphasizes solutions that focus on “the…
Elizabeth Emerson’s perspective on grassroots organizing was shaped by her service as a field coordinator for the late U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone. Following a stint as a Minnesota House staffer,…
Dakota County has a thriving business community, with employers such as Thomson Reuters, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Prime Therapeutics. Maureen Scallen Failor, the Eagan-based Dakota County chamber head since…
David Fhima has been vocal about his belief that downtown Minneapolis companies need to call back their workers, so he led by example, reopening his Seventh Street restaurant Fhima’s for…
Like many people, Erin Flavin realized that she had been drinking too much during the pandemic. The owner of Honeycomb salon in Minneapolis had to close down her business in…
Small and midsize manufacturers need and want cool tech, too. Since founding St. Paul-based ManufacturingPower.com in 2017, industrial supply veteran Mike Franz has been helping these makers connect with supply…
A zookeeper at the Minnesota Zoo in his 20s, John Frawley, now in his 50s, experienced a full-circle moment when he was tapped to be director of the organization in…
Tracey Gibson says it’s important to understand that DEI is not confined to the human resources department—it’s driven by leaders at all levels of an organization making inclusion a business…
After nearly five years as CFO of the Science Museum of Minnesota, Barry Gisser recently joined another St. Paul institution—American Public Media Group. APMG’s consolidated revenue for fiscal 2021 was…
In 2016, when Philando Castile was fatally shot by a St. Anthony police officer during a traffic stop, Jazz Hampton, Andre Creighton, and Mychal Frelix began looking for solutions to…
A nearly 20-year Target veteran, Christina Hennington became the retailer’s first chief growth officer in early 2021. It’s a role that has her leading Target’s strategy, merchandising, and sourcing efforts,…
The Super Bowl and NCAA Final Four get more attention, but the Twin Cities is currently building toward something even bigger: playing host to the 2026 U.S. Special Olympics, which…
The Gandhi Mahal restaurant off Minneapolis’ East Lake Street burned down during the civil unrest in 2020, but it's been serving customers out of the Seward neighborhood Indian restaurant Curry…