Published: May 08, 2008 12:31 am            

James W. Strate Center of Business Development’s first client is settling in

Five hundred square feet in the James W. Strate Center for Business Development will be the new home of Custom Land Management LLC and its manager, Cara Evans.

“I’m super-excited to be here,” Evans, 25, said. “I was working out of the third bedroom in my house.”

Evans is the first client to lease office space in the business incubator, located behind Autry Technology Center, 1201 W. Willow.

“It’s an incredible resource,” Evans said of the center. “It really saves on overhead.”

In addition to supplying Internet access, fax and copy machines and furniture, the center provides personnel resources in the form of Ron Duggin, Dale Shaffer and Terry Henneke, who will lend their individual expertise to burgeoning businesses.

Networking is another benefit to being part of the center, Evans said, especially with Autry’s connection to other CareerTechs throughout the state.

Duggins, center director, said while Evans is the first client, there are other people going through the application process. Interested people have to provide a written business plan and a market-ready product or service.

Rental agreements consist of a one-year lease at a lower-than-market rate. Every year, Duggin said, the cost of rent increases until it’s even, or above, the cost to rent a facility outside the center.

“This is geared toward getting the new businesses out into the community,” he said.

Duggin said the center is set up for businesses ranging from service in-dustries to light manufacturing.

“We’ll look at pretty much anybody except di-rect retail or restaurants,” he said.

Evans said she thinks her business is a good fit for the center.

CLM, a subsidiary of Encompass Financial Ser-vices Inc., of Cherokee, is an Oklahoma limited liability company that provides management, consulting, analytical and valuation services for commercial, residential and agricultural projects and real estate developments.

“I help put the right people together for projects,” Evans said. Cur-rently, she’s working on two projects in Enid — a mausoleum and a loft —she wants to “knock out of the park.”

Evans graduated from Oklahoma State Univer-sity in 2004 with a degree in marketing.

“There’s a big push to bring entreprenuership to Enid,” she said. “Everyone is so pumped you’re bringing something back. No one wants you to fail.”