Contestants in the eighth annual Associate competition, held by the College of Business and Economics, introduced themselves and were given their first challenge on Feb. 7.

The contestants, who are all seniors, have been divided into two teams comprising four business majors for the competition. This year’s teams are Team Connect and Team Mosaic.

Team Connect consists of Michelle Fox, Lauren Gribbon, Matt Stone and Alex Yershov. Team Mosaic is composed of Javier Bermudez, Megan Harvey, Kerry Worthington and Andrea Goldstein.

Goldstein said this competition has been a stepping stone for many successful Towson University business students.

“The competition overall proves to produce some of the best students from the whole College of Business and Economics,” Goldstein said. “I don’t want to say it’s a once-in-a-college opportunity, but it honestly is.”

Gribbon said she is proud to be in the competition and became interested in it her freshman year.

“I think it’s a great opportunity. I’m honored to have been selected for it,” Gribbon said.

Nick Malone, a Towson alumni and winner of The Associate competition, is a branch manager with Enterprise Rent-A-Car and helped present the first challenge to teams.

About one year ago, Enterprise expanded Rideshare, a vanpooling program, to the Baltimore-metro region. Enterprise representatives said the program has been very successful with military and government employees.

However, they want to increase the program’s popularity with companies that may have parking needs, commuting issues or want to offer the program as a benefit to employees.

In their proposal, teams must identify the ideal candidate for Rideshare, identify common traits of employer carpool programs, and complete a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis comparing Enterprise Rideshare to their competition.

Teams must develop a marketing plan that includes presentation materials, office flyers, print advertisements and social media to build brand awareness with consumers.

Teams also need to sell employers on supporting the vanpool program and have a plan to encourage employees to attend meetings to form a vanpool.

PNC Vice President Matthew Martin, the “Donald” in this year’s competition, said though the work Enterprise does is different from PNC, he looks forward to hearing the ideas the students create.

“There may be something in one of their presentations that I can use myself,” he said.

Teams will meet Feb. 14 to present their proposal with Enterprise. The winning team will be announced, and the first firing will occur. Then, the teams will receive their second challenge.

“I’m excited to see what’s going to happen in the future. It’s a lot to do in a week, but I think we’re all up for the challenge,” Fox said.