Celebrating 7 Years of the North Atlanta Venture Mentoring Service
Starting a business is one of the boldest moves a person can make — and one of the loneliest. Entrepreneurs make dozens of high-stakes decisions a week with no roadmap, no manual, and often no one in their corner who’s been there before. That’s exactly the gap the North Atlanta Venture Mentoring Service (NAV) was built to close.
This July marks seven years since NAV opened its doors on July 1, 2019 — and seven years of proving that no founder should have to figure it out alone.
What Is NAV, and Why Is It Different?
NAV is a free, team-based mentoring program for entrepreneurs looking to scale and grow their ventures in the North Atlanta area. Powered by the Cherokee Office of Economic Development (COED) as part of its Startup Cherokee initiative, NAV was the first program of its kind in Georgia — principled and trained by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Venture Mentoring Service (MIT VMS), a model with a 20+ year track record across 34 countries. NAV proudly represents the 90th MIT VMS sister program in the world.
What sets NAV apart from a typical mentor-mentee pairing is its team-based approach. Instead of matching a founder with a single advisor, NAV surrounds each venture with a team of mentors — executives, founders, and specialists with real, hard-won experience across industries like finance, marketing, operations, sales, and technology. That diversity of perspective is the whole point: the best answer to a hard business problem rarely comes from just one voice.
As NAV mentor Mark Caldwell put it:
“I especially enjoy the back-and-forth dialogue between mentors when they disagree. Not only do I learn from that, but the discussion between the mentors is potentially one of the most valuable things the venture can get.”
Seven Years of Impact, By the Numbers
Since launching with 20 founding mentors and three pilot ventures in 2019, NAV has grown into one of North Atlanta’s most trusted resources for scaling entrepreneurs. Seven years later, the program’s fingerprints are all over Cherokee County’s entrepreneurial landscape:
- 41 Ventures served since launch
- 3,971 Total mentoring hours since launch
- 31 Active mentors
- 53 Mentors engaged since launch
- 12 Active ventures
- 71% minority or woman owned
NAV ventures have gone on to open second locations, purchase land, create local jobs, and secure their products in major department stores and become recognizable names throughout the community — from Alma Coffee and Bizarre Coffee to American Pillar Growers, SuiteSciens, Eden Smoothies, The Cloud Makers and more. Each one started the same way every NAV venture does: with a founder willing to ask for help, and a team of mentors willing to give it.
In Their Own Words
Numbers tell part of the story. The founders and mentors who live it tell the rest.
“I am grateful to the NAV Mentoring Service team for this. The shift from reactive to strategic does not happen by accident. It takes honest feedback from people who have built what you are trying to build,” — Shalakay Gibbs, Founder at SuiteSciens
“We would not be where we are today without NAV,” — Tony & Jill Whitfield, Founders at Y-Not Sharp
“The cool thing about Cherokee County is they really pour into incubating small businesses. We were exposed to programs like the Cherokee Office of Economic Development’s North Atlanta Venture Mentoring Service. It’s so important for new businesses to have access to programs like that because it really sets you up for success and encourages growth,”— Sabrina & Michael Kaylor, Founders at Bizarre Coffee
“The NAV program is true servant-leadership in action, and an opportunity for us, as mentors, to assist new business leaders in their journey while we pay back those who provided the advice and guidance that helped shape our own careers and businesses in the past,” — Jim Bulger, President & Founder at WorkThrive
“When we champion small business success, we’re not just building companies — we’re strengthening the North Atlanta community as a whole,” — DD Garzon, Industry Liaison at PURE Property Management
Past NAV founders have described the experience as the difference between guessing and knowing. As Clint Ober of American Pillar Growers shared after graduating the program:
“NAV helped motivate me to get focused, be strategic and be intentional in my business…I don’t know how to say the gratitude and thanks for what my mentors and NAV have given in value.”
Why Mentorship Matters — For Any Entrepreneur
You don’t have to be a NAV venture to feel the truth behind this program: entrepreneurs who have access to structured mentorship are more likely to survive the early, volatile years of business — and more likely to grow past them. Mentorship offers what no amount of research or trial-and-error can replicate on its own:
- Perspective from people who’ve already made (and survived) the mistakes.
- Accountability to keep moving instead of spinning in place.
- A sounding board for decisions that are too big to make alone.
- A community that reminds founders they’re not actually on an island.
This is the foundation NAV was built on back in 2019, and it’s the same belief driving the program today: entrepreneurs are the heroes of their own story, and mentors are the guides who help them navigate the journey.
Here’s to the Next Seven Years
Seven years in, NAV is still growing — still recruiting mentors, still welcoming new ventures, and still proving that Cherokee County and the greater North Atlanta area is one of the best places in Georgia to build a business with real support behind you.
Are you scaling a business and looking for the kind of guidance that comes from a whole team of experienced advisors — for free? Apply to become a NAV venture.
Have you built and grown a company, and want to help the next generation of North Atlanta entrepreneurs do the same? Learn more about becoming a NAV mentor.
Here’s to the entrepreneurs who took the leap, the mentors who showed up for them, and seven years of proof that mentorship matters.
