Running a business requires a strong will and a lot of creativity, but also many hard skills which may be hard to develop alone. 

Lethbridge Polytechnic’s Business Admin program prepares students to become entrepreneurs by providing them with those hard skills. 

Brad Gadd, a 2006 graduate of the program entered the program to obtain the necessary skills to develop his handmade leather business named Populess.

“I wanted to take the business admin program to learn how to properly know the ins and outs of running a business,” said Gadd. 

Gadd sells his products across North America and has slowly become a local staple within the past two decades. 

Gadd credits his entrepreneurial mindset for his success but acknowledges that without the skills he learned within his education he wouldn’t have known how to grow Populess into what it is today.

“I think for myself, because I knew I was more entrepreneurial, that it gave me the, the, the set of tools I needed to go, for what I wanted to accomplish,” shared Gadd. 

Since graduating from the Polytechnic in 2005, Gadd has taken Populess from a one-man operation to a downtown storefront. 

Populess employee Andrew Galloway was inspired by Gadd and decided to join the Business Admin program in order to follow the same path as his boss. 

He shared that his biggest motivator in becoming an entrepreneur is the feeling of gratification he hopes to find in creating his own business.

“I feel like it kind of gives you a sense of pride of working hard and making something that is your own and, just making something that you can be proud of,” said Galloway.

Gadd has seen great success since graduating from the Business Admin program. He shared that he will continue to pursue his dream as a leathermaker for the rest of his life.