SFU Surrey student wins entrepreneur award
Ben Brown-Bentley, 604.240.7700 (cell); ben@adrenaline-productions.ca
Marianne Meadahl, PAMR, 778.782.4323; marianne_meadahl@sfu.ca
Simon Fraser University engineering student Ben Brown-Bentley is the Surrey Board of Trade’s latest student entrepreneur of the year.
Brown-Bentley was among recipients honored with a Surrey Business Excellence Award Nov. 4. Jane Fee, associate dean of SFU’s Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, presented him with the award.
The 20-year-old Surrey student runs Adrenaline Productions, an events production company specializing in all-age and late night dance events.
Brown-Bentley started the company two years ago after working as an employee for other similar companies. “I was making $5 off the $100 tickets I was selling and realized that I could turn things around and be the one making the bigger profit,” says the young entrepreneur.
Brown-Bentley, a graduate of Elgin Park secondary school, completed his first year at SFU Surrey in the university’s Tech One program and is heading into his third year in the thriving Mechatronics Systems Engineering program.
He earlier did a co-op a stint in the program during his Grade 11 high school science co-op term. “Engineering is a great program, it teaches you to learn yourself how things work, which is really useful in many applications,” says Brown-Bentley, who plans to keep at his studies at SFU and eventually earn a Master’s of Business Administration (MBA).
Brown-Bentley also spent the summer working on contract with the Surrey Food Bank and hopes to volunteer there over Christmas.
Last year Brown-Bentley and his company won SFU SIFE’s (Students in Free Enterprise) Student Entrepreneur award.
He formed Adrenaline Productions with partner Joel Isfeld to create safe and managed environments for parties and dances.
Working with the city, nightclub and police, Adrenaline licenses a normally 19+ nightclub to remove all alcohol and allow teens to party safely in a secure environment. “Adrenaline is the first company in the Lower Mainland to offer teen dance events at a nightclub,” he says.
During the award ceremony it was noted that Adrenaline Productions “has seen nothing but success in all of its endeavours, with growth not seen in any Metro Vancouver based productions company in years, and no doubt has a very bright future ahead.”
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