The student-athlete juggles schoolwork, practices and the stress that comes with being on a highly competitive sports team while also taking college level classes. Taking this into account, the schedule of the student-athlete-entrepreneur is even more strenuous.
Alex Vawter and Chris Baker are both freshmen student-athletes who play baseball. Both also play integral roles in the creation of their company “Investment Made Easy.” Investment Made Easy aims to assist clients in understanding the financial market as well as gain experience in it. Vawter is the CEO and Baker is the chief administrative officer (CAO) according to investmentmadeeasy.net.
Vawter accredits the creation of the company to his interest in trading in the stock market. “We started early this school year. I’ve been trading in the markets for quite some time, not too long, but for a couple years or so, and I started to get really into it once I got to college because I wanted to find an actual source of income instead of getting a job and doing that kind of route,” Vawter said.
As spring sports are well underway, the baseball team is constantly practicing and travelling to games. Despite an already hectic schedule, Baker and Vawter still do daily work with their company. “So really, just a ton of marketing and working with clients, we have an alerts group, which is kind of like the bulk of what we do on a daily basis…we post the trades that we’re making in this group so that all of our clients can see the trades we’re making in the stock market, cryptocurrencies, and things like that,” Vawter said.
Although managing a company can be time consuming, their online presence makes it a little easier. “Since our company’s basically online, it’s not like somewhere you walk up to, it’s easier to be able to manage and send Twitter tweets, or Instagram posts or anything…but it has been tough to manage, but we just know that this business is going to work out in the long run so we just make sure we give it everything we have even though we have other obligations,” Baker said.
The boys complete a lot of the work that Investment Made Easy requires at night, once they are relieved from their baseball and student priorities. Vawter explained that they utilize the Hofheimer Library to hold their meetings. He also said that they typically do not hold these meetings until about 9 or 10 p.m.
Running a new business from the ground up can be a grueling process. It can also take a while to begin to see successful results. However, it only took Investment Made Easy a little under a year to obtain a client who plays in the National Football League.
“We’ve been working with Bryson Keeton of the New York Jets, he’s a defensive back, and we’ve been working alongside him. He found out about us through social media, we hop on calls with him from time to time…he’s kind of been talking to us about introducing our company and our services to some of his other NFL friends, coaches,” Vawter said.
Vawter and Baker further expressed their enthusiasm to have Bryson Keeton as a client and a part of their team. “It’s really exciting to start this company less than a year ago and to already have clients like that,” Vawter said.
The two feel that the relevance and necessity of this type of company will bring them further success. “There’s a lot of investment information and investment education out there, but it’s not targeted towards people who have no idea what they’re doing in the market…we want to introduce new people in this market and bring beginners into this market continually because that’s where I was,” Vawter said.
‘I think our main goal is to be able to go to one place and find everything you need to know, and how to get into cryptocurrencies or FOREX trading,” Baker said.
Baker and Vawter also expressed their gratitude to their teammates for supporting them and their business. They also said that they are constantly assisting their teammates and coaches in beginning to become involved in the stock market.
Megan Sherman
mrsherman@vwu.edu
