AUSTIN DAILY HERALD F THURSDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2019
A path of numbers and service Wealth Management Solutions’ Brianne Brede in stride with her career By Eric Johnson newsroom@austindailyherald.com
What started out as a love for math classes in high school has blossomed into a rewarding and enjoyable career for Brianne Brede. A financial advisor for Wealth Management Solutions in Austin, Brede has moved up the ranks while finding a wealth of fulfillment along the way. “Every day is different,” Brede said from her corner office above the Coffee House on Main. “It’s not one of those jobs where you do the same job every day, over and over again. When we work with clients we develop really strong relationships with them.” B re d e ’s c a re e r p at h started early on when she was looking for a career that could combine her love of math with her desire to work with people. “So with the math background, the process of helping others and and the personal relations that can be built, were some of the more intriguing reasons to get into the business” Brede explained. There was a time when she flirted with nursing, but that idea was quickly put to rest. “I realized in my first anatomy and physiology class that it was not for me so I backtracked,” Brede said. Rather, financial planning was always on her radar, and so it was an easy thing for her to come back to, but it also had some bumps that made her question if this was the right path. “At that point in time I didn’t have the well-rounded understanding of everything that went into it,” Brede said. “I kind of had that mindset that it was investment only. That was during the time of the stock market crash in the 2000s. The end of the tech
bubble. Then I got a little bit hesitant with it. Is this what I want to do?” Brede has worn a lot of hats in her 14 years of experience with a variety of areas she focuses on, but one thing she really enjoys is multi-general planning and being a guide for those people on the way to retirement. It’s an effort that requires her to be able to touch on all aspects during that transitional journey. “Working with clients not only with accumulating wealth for retirement, but typically I find people that have done a really good job of saving and getting to that point where they really want to be, but they then don’t like to take the time to spend the money on themselves,” Brede said. Brede takes her clients through things like estate planning and charitable giving. Often times, it can seem like her job is more mental wellbeing than financial advising. That can be especially important when everything is so readily available in terms of the world around us. There was a time when financial news and those items that can sometimes affect finances came from the advisor, but now that information is splashed across screens in real time, which can make things more nerve-wracking than maybe is needed for clients. “We often joke among ourselves, that sometimes we’re counselors,” Brede said. “You try to manage behaviors and sometimes that can be difficult for people when you turn on the news and the media. You have all the bad news out there. You see the blurbs that the market is crashing or whatever and there is some panic that can set in to people, just in general. Nobody likes
“I started kind of at the bottom and worked my way up over the years and I have great appreciation for that” – Breanne Brede Ameriprise, Wealth Management Solutions Financial Advisor
Breanne Brede enjoys guiding her clients through money management at Wealth Management Solutions. Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindialyherald.com
to hear bad news.” Things can change so quickly, that often it can come at the drop of tweet. “We often joke, we’re one tweet away from the market going up and one tweet from the market going down,” she explained. “And when those events occur, people just need somebody to reassure them and talk them through it.” Brede admits juggling the news she’s receiving between meetings with her clients is an aspect of her job she needs to improve on. And that’s where the supporting nature of Wealth Management Solutions and Ameriprise, the umbrella company of WMS, becomes so important. For those wishing to grow and become stronger in their jobs, employees are offered every opportu-
nity to grow and become stronger as an advisor. Brede admits it’s been a challenging process since first getting into the business, but it’s been made optimal because of the opportunities she’s received. “I started kind of at the bottom and worked my way up over the years and I have great appreciation for that,” Brede said. “Now, when I have conversations with all of our other team members I can relate to the work I’m asking them to do and know all of it from the backend.” “It’s been a nice transition,” she added. “It’s also been a rewarding transition.” That has come from the partners of WMS enthusiastic about ensuring their employees have the opportunities to grow. “The managing partners
of Wealth Management Solutions have always had — and I think that’s one of the reasons that’s kept me with the team — they’ve always had the mindset that regardless of what role you start at, there’s no limit where you can go,” she said. There is another aspect of working where she is and doing the work that she does that has been particularly enjoyable for Brede. Community outreach is something that both WMS and Ameriprise values and it’s something Brede holds dear as well. Not only do WMS employees make time for community service, but it’s also a fundamental foundation of Ameriprise as well through National Day of Service. It fits well with what Bre-
de and WMS values. “We in our office have always been community focused, especially in small town Austin,” Brede said.”We’ve always made it a point to do something like that, but Ameriprise has taken it to another level.” That level now includes two National Days of Service — in the fall and spring. All in all, this path Brede has walked has turned out to be everything that she hoped it would be. “It’s so much more,” she said. “I can honestly say I enjoy coming to work every day. I can tell you. There’s no day that’s ever the same. It’s fun, it’s hard work, but it’s fun and the relationships that we build with our clients are solid and strong. I consider the team here a work family.”
Established 1915
Over 100 Years of Service
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Women in Business
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2019
A special supplement to the AUSTIN DAILY HERALD
Detours along the way Britt Fossum’s unplanned road to Hy-Vee store director has been a welcome change By Eric Johnson newsroom@austindailyherald.com
Austin Hy-Vee Store Director Britt Fossum had a plan and behind that plan was the drive to get the best for both her and her son during the early days as a Hy-Vee employee. But that plan was for nursing, not store director in one of the nation’s most popular g rocery store chains. Still, it’s a change she’s relishing today. “At the time I was a single mom. I was highly motivated to really progress as far as I could in whatever position I was in,” Fossum said. “Ultimately, seeking out full-time employment was important to me. I was looking for insurance, things like that.” During that time, Fossum was a nursing student at Rochester Technical and Community College. To get through the schooling, Fossum took a job as a part-time cashier at the Hy-Vee Barlow Plaza location in Rochester. It didn’t take long before she started seeing m ove m e n t w i t h i n t h e company while at the same time questioning wh e t h e r n u r s i n g w a s right for her. “My whole life I thought I was going to be a nurse,” Fossum said, who comes from a family with nurses in it. “I always thought that it was the way I wanted to go. Ultimately, I thought nursing was the only way to help people. I’ve always loved people and wanted to help people and then going to school I realized, ‘well I don’t know if this is what I want to do.’” Fossum jumped all-in to the journey. Six months after starting her time at the store, she was promoted to customer service clerk, and another six months later jumped to assistant manager. She was assistant manager for a few years before she became Human Resources manager for five years, moved further up the management ladder, and then took the store director training program. Her first job as store director was in Waseca, where she was for three years before taking the position in Austin. “Really the biggest driv-
ing factor was my son,” Fossum said. “I had an amazing store director there that saw potential in me at that time and kind of pushed me along the way. Really, the positions just kept opening up there, good opportunities, I couldn’t say no and I didn’t want to.” Fossum quickly realized that this was just another way to help people, even if Hy-Vee wasn’t the next planned stop in her life. “I just stumbled on HyVee,” she said. “It was a part time job to get me through school. There were other ways I could help customers, help people.” It’s a contradiction in a way from her early impressions, admitting she didn’t see the room for advancement that is actually there. “There were a lot of opportunities,” Fossum said. “Hy-Vee really takes care of its employees. There are just a lot of things with how Hy-Vee is trying to take care of its employees and a really amazing team at the Rochester location that was super supportive and I had an amazing store director too that kind of dangled the golden carrot.” Fossum pointed in particular to the suppor t from her store director at the time as being a big part of where she is now. “He always had an open door and was willing to take the time to sit down and talk to any employee and any customer to,” Fossum said. It’s an aspect that Fossum herself tries to bring to her own position as store director. She wants to foster that growth within her own store by doing what she can to make sure her employees have the same opportunities she had. It’s an open door. “It’s fun for me and rewarding to spot some talent and some drive in an employee that’s willing to and has the desire to move up in the company,” Fossum said. “It’s inspiring to me to sit with those employees to see what we can do to coach them onto that next place for finding the right seat on the bus for that employee.”
“The appeal for me was definitely helping customers. I love working with employees too” – Britt Fossum Austin Hy-Vee Store Director
Britt Fossum has risen through the ranks of Hy-Vee from clerk to store director of Austin’s Hy-Vee. Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindailyherald.com
Her position also allows her to do what she loves the most. Working with people, either with those employees under her or the customers that shop her aisles. It’s helped foster in her the love for a profession that wasn’t initially on the radar at the beginning — working for a company that puts it’s full support behind its employees. “The appeal for me was definitely helping customers,” she said. “I love working with employees too, but Hy-Vee has a really neat structure that ba-
sically you get a lot of the benefits of running your own store, there’s still autonomy. There’s things I can do here. There’s definitely corporate programs that I fully support as well, but we can kind of adjust things on dayto-day basis to take care of what Austin wants and what each location wants without having the full risk of having your own business.” “It’s a unique structure I haven’t seen before,” she added. “There’s a lot of great mentors along the way.”
A special supplement to the AUSTIN DAILY HERALD
Women in Business
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2019
‘I’ve been very fortunate here’ Twice is Nice owner Sandra Bell celebrates 17 years in business “ We d o n’ t h ave a n y e m p t y bu i l d i n g s a ny I f yo u ’ ve g o n e i n t o more; we are full,” she Twice is Nice in Down- said. “In 17 years, that’s town Austin, across Main the most I’ve ever seen Street from the Spam Mu- it. Our downtown is full, seum, chances are you’ve and we hear from our run into Sandra Bell. Now customers that Austin is in her 17th year of own- awesome with the downing Twice is Nice, Bell has town and Main Street and been an available source the flowers. Everybody’s for those seeking cloth- really impressed.” ing, home décor and anBut like many businesstiques. es, Twice is Nice finds itBut the Mower County self competing with onnative didn’t start in re- line shopping. This is one tail. She used to work at of the reasons that Bell is Hormel Foods and was a a supporter of the “Eat. stay-at-home mom before Drink. Shop. Austin” iniher best friend opened tiative. Twice is Nice in the base“I think before somement of the now closed one pushes a button on Nemitz’s. the Internet, (Eat. Drink. “I always loved fashion Shop. Austin) makes them and antiques and home think twice,” she said. “I décor, so I wanted to work hope it does because we for her,” Bell said. “It was need to keep money in a smaller location and the county and be proud she didn’t of our city have as maso we can TWICE IS ny gifts.” g row as a NICE 17TH Bell encommunity. joyed the The downANNIVERSARY job, prompttown is the Twice is Nice is ing her to heartbeat of celebrating its 17th make a bold a city.” anniversary on Friday decision The Spam and Saturday, Nov. 1-2. when her Museum and The event will feature friend was “Eat. Drink. hourly drawings, ready to S h o p. Au s gourmet food, cider move on. tin” aside, and coffee and “She was Bell also unbelievable deals. ready to sell credits a solFor more information, and I decidid business call 507-433-5353. ed I wanted model and to continue local supin it because I really loved port for her continued it,” she said. success. When Bell purchased “ I t h i n k i t ’s h av i n g the store, it was located the combination of all – Sandra Bell where Vintage Vixen is three (clothes, home déOwner, Twice is Nice today. cor and antiques) that “We moved three times really works,” she said. when she owned it, so “That’s how women and when this (location) came men shop; we buy some up for sale 15 years ago, I cl o t h e s, we bu y s o m e bought it,” she said. home décor, we buy some With a love of fashion and antiques, Sandra Bell’s Twice is Nice offers both. Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindailyherald.com At the time, Main Street antiques, and I really looked quite dif ferent think that fits in everyfrom what it does today. body’s home. I’ve been “All of the buildings very fortunate here. I’ve were pretty much emp- had a lot of local supportty,” Bell recalled. “This ers that follow me. When wasn’t the only building they come home to visit for sale; there were a lot their parents, they come of them. It’s amazing to to visit us. I think being see how much it’s grown here 17 years, we’ve reand thrived. In the very ally established a followbeginning, it was a hard ing. Everybody loves the time for people.” different variety we have Despite the dif ficul- to offer in the store.” t y, B e l l ke p t T w i c e i s Twice is Nice is locatNice going, creating the ed at 417 N Main St. in three-story store it is to- Downtown Austin. Hours day. The opening of the of operation are 10 a.m. to Spam Museum across the 5:30 p.m. Monday through street has only contribut- Thursday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. ed to her success. on Friday and 10 a.m. to “It’s been nice having 4 p.m. on Saturday. They that extra energy down- can be reached at 507-433town,” Bell said. “One 5353. of the best things they “I want to thank all of could have done was to our customers and the put that Spam Museum c o m m u n i t y fo r a l l o f downtown to revitalize these years,” Bell said. our downtown. Before, we “When I tell people we’ve had a hole there that was b e e n i n bu s i n e s s t h i s an eyesore.” long, it’s kind of unheard When asked if she be- of these days. I want to lieved Downtown Austin thank everybody for lovis growing, Bell’s answer ing our store and supportwas an emphatic “yes.” ing us.” By Michael Stoll
mike.stoll@austindailyherald.com
“When I tell people we’ve been in business this long, it’s kind of unheard of these days. I want to thank everybody for loving our store and supporting us.”
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Women in Business
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2019
A special supplement to the AUSTIN DAILY HERALD
Fulfilling the American Dream Austere Htoo Apolo’s grocery store represents pride and a journey to success By Hannah Yang hannah.yang@austindailyherald.com
Inside the K’Nyaw Grocery Store, those looking to find a wealth of ingredients to recreate some of their homemade food can find it there. Since 2017, the specialty food store carries loads of produce (both fresh and frozen) that come from different Asian courtiers and states like California. There were often popular requests made from customers searching for frozen Betel nuts, otherwise known as areca nuts, used in tobacco or treatment for various health disorders. For Austere Htoo Apolo, owner of K’Nyaw, this was the type of business that her family had always dreamed of owning, and helping members of the community find what they need brings her an immense sense of accomplishment. The path to owning her own grocery store wasn’t perfectly linear, but it was clear that fate intended for Apolo to achieve her dreams. A family friend sought to sell their grocery store in Austin that was previously called the Lighthouse and was located inside the former Plunkett Law building. The family decided to purchase the inventory and assets, and the store reopened under the name K’Nyaw Grocery Store. For those looking for fresh and frozen ingredients to make different Asian dishes, those types of items can be hard to come by in rural areas. Often times, people would need to travel closer to the metro areas where there were more diverse populations and businesses. However, having never run a business before, Apolo had to lear n the challenges that came with being a business owner quickly. The realities of operating a grocery store with no prior experience became apparent, and the first year of ownership was extremely difficult. “We kind of got ourselves into a big mess because we have not had any business experience,” she remarked. “Learning everything at once was difficult, especially for the first year. But the rewarding part is when we hear customers say they do not have to travel far to get their products. A majority of our customers would have to go to Rochester, Owatonna or even St. Paul if we do not carry the food they eat regularly.” More hardships came when the Plunkett building was slated for demolition, and without a clear vision of where
they would go, the future seemed dire for the family and their livelihood. Plus, with Apolo’s father in poor health, he could not go to work at Hormel Foods or Quality Pork Processors for manufacturing jobs. However, through the help of local leadership, Apolo and her family were able to find another place to relocate by April 2019. They reopened their store again in late August 2019 at its current location of 404 First St. NW and held a grand opening in September to wide success. Apolo was able to keep t h e f a m i ly s t o re r u n ning,and her father could take it easy. But, K’Nyaw Grocery Store was more than just something that pulled in income for her family it was also a lifeline to maintain the quality of health for her father and possibly future employees. “T his allows him to sit when he needs it, and ensure the care of his health,” she said. “We envision growing our store slowly and employ other people going through similar situations my dad went through.” The Apolos went through atrocities that many others would never dare to imagine. They came to the United States in 2013 after living in a refugee camp in Thailand, during a time when Myanmar (Burma) was going through a civil war. After finding refuge and immigrating to Minnesota, they lived in Worthington before settling down in Austin. They rebuilt their lives after having so much taken away from them. For them to be able
“Having an Asian food store allows us to serve our community by providing fresh vegetables and package items that they may not be able to purchase in local markets.” – Austere Htoo Apolo Owner, K’Nyaw Grocery Store
Austere Htoo Apolo, owner of K’Nyaw Grocery Store, is taking part in a family dream to own her own business. Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindailyherald.com
to own their own business represented the journey Apolo’s family embarked on after having to leave their home country. Ownership of the grocery store taught Apolo many things, such as talk to those who were experi-
enced veterans in the business that a person is trying to pursue, check the pros and cons and make sure there are back-up options. But most importantly, don’t give up even if you don’t get any profit for the first couple of years.
Despite the strife that they experienced, the family was able to make their dreams come true and start over. “ O u r f a m i ly a lw ay s wanted to have our own store,” Apolo said. “Having an Asian food store
allow us to serve our community by providing fresh vegetables and package items that they may not be able to purchase in the local markets. Having our own business also gave us the sense of ownership and belonging.”