With some help from an entrepreneurial organization, Halifax students take the business world by storm SOME YOUNG Halifax-based entrepreneurs went on a winning streak this spring.

Alex MacLean (right), the brains behind the über successful East Coast Lifestyle Clothing Inc., won the Enactus Canada Student Entrepreneur National Competition this spring. The win also qualified the Halifax native and Acadia University student to attend the Global Student Entrepreneur Awards in Washington, D.C., where he was up against 43 other budding student businesspeople from around the world. MacLean couldn’t duplicate his win at the global competition, but he did finish an impressive second overall.

Meanwhile, a team of Saint Mary’s University students won the BDC Entrepreneurs First Project Partnership Best Project during the spring as well. The competition is designed to give teams affiliated with the Enactus organization across the country the skills and resources to make a meaningful difference in their communities through entrepreneurship. The team won the award for “The Startup 100” project, which provided young people with the chance to design, plan and implement business ideas to reenergize their local economies.

But what is Enactus exactly? It’s a national organization supporting entrepreneurship and social innovation through student-led community empowerment projects and student entrepreneurs. MacLean’s business came about through a project he was doing for his entrepreneurship class at Acadia where he set out to sell 30 East Coast Lifestyle hoodies in 2013. Since then, over 250,000 of his company’s products have been sold and MacLean has high praise for Enactus, saying it’s the “best entrepreneurship program in Canada.”