Sometimes our downtown business owners are busy minding their shop and cannot attend in-person training. Sometimes they have just an hour during lunch break to take advantage of a short class. Knowing these challenges, the Virginia Highlands Small Business Incubator has teamed up with the Virginia Department of Small Business and Supplier Diversity (SBSD) and Washington County Virginia Chamber of Commerce to create the “Noon Knowledge” professional development series.

Each week classes are taught by regional experts on a variety of business-related topics ranging from marketing, business management, technology and more during the noon lunch hour. Sandy Ratliff, business services manager with SBSD, also uses the LiveStream service and the new Facebook Live feature to allow participants that cannot attend in-person to watch live via their own computer, tablet or smartphone. There is also an archive of the videos on the Noon Knowledge YouTube channel for viewing by anyone in future, at their convenience. This is an excellent resource for your businesses who may want to catch a specific topic, but do notalways have the time during work hours. For more information about upcoming trainings, visit http://events.vastartup.org.