Business Person of the Year dinner is March 29

Gregory S. Wollaston, Class of '96; co-owner of Buster Brown Bean Company

SUNY Fredonia’s Business Club has named Gregory S. Wollaston as its 34th Business Person of the Year. Mr. Wollaston will be honored with a dinner ceremony on Tuesday, March 29, at 6:30 p.m., in the Multipurpose Room of the Williams Center.

The evening’s keynote address will be delivered by Class of 1979 Fredonia alumnus Dave Fountaine, president of AQUEST Consulting LLC.

Any person interested in attending the dinner is asked to R.S.V.P. by Friday, March 11. No reservations will be accepted after this date. To R.S.V.P., contact and pay Bobbi Tabak, secretary, School of Business, E336 Thompson Hall, 716-673-3505. Checks can be made payable to the Business Club and cost of the dinner is $25. Students can also use their meal plan points to pay for the dinner and should see Ms. Tabak for more information.

The Business Person of the Year Award is given by the Business Club every spring to an individual in the local community who exhibits outstanding business leadership, public service, integrity and genuine concern for the well-being of his or her employees.  

Wollaston, a 1996 graduate of SUNY Fredonia, holds the position of CEO of Buster Brown Bean Company, a series of six cafes located on the Fredonia campus. He and his partner, David Culver, are both SUNY Fredonia alumni and co-owners of the business. The company is proud to be a local, family-owned small business with a simple mission statement: to provide the best coffee, tea and chai to their customers. Wollaston continues to try and find new ways to increase the variety and level of service provided by BBBC.

In his role as CEO of Buster Brown Bean Company, Wollaston has demonstrated the traits of an outstanding business leader that the SUNY Fredonia Business Club believes are deserving of recognition: community involvement, business ethics, business innovations, concern for employees and contribution to the growth of local business. 

Buster Brown Bean Company employs eight full-time, non-student workers and 30 to 32 part-time student workers. Wollaston and Culver are known for their concern for their employees, and are very flexible in working with their students’ schedules. Recent expansion efforts on campus include a joint venture with the Business Club’s Snack Shack to provide BBBC coffee service in Thompson Hall. Wollaston’s business acumen, foresight and fairness have helped the company continuously grow and thrive.

Buster Brown Bean Company is involved in various charitable efforts locally and worldwide. Wollaston has endowed a $10,000 scholarship for student employees through the Fredonia College Foundation. BBBC is a corporate sponsor for the  Blue Devils hockey team’s “Pink the Rink” annual fundraiser for cancer research. In addition, website sales generate donations for the Lakeshore Humane Society.  Worldwide, BBBC provides support for schools, free women’s clinics and cervical cancer screenings in coffee-producing countries. Buster Brown Bean Company has emerged as a prominent business that does coffee the right way. 

Keynote speaker Fountaine is the President of AQUEST Consulting LLC. He is a performance improvement consultant who enjoys working with organizations to identify, assess and improve organizational performance problems. He commits a significant amount of time providing performance improvement consulting to 22 automotive dealerships in the Western New
York and Pennsylvania area and serves on several task forces for General Motors in Detroit.

Fountaine is a member of the Board of Examiners for the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program.  He has taught as an adjunct professor in business and human resources for over 20 years and has served a total of 22 years of active and reserve service as an U.S. Army officer. His strengths and experience are in the fields of strategic planning, human resources management, organizational self-assessment and training. Fountaine received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from SUNY Fredonia and currently serves on the Fredonia Alumni Association Board of Directors.

To learn more about the Business Person of the Year Dinner, contact Matt Reiners at rein5372@fredonia.edu.