From the boardroom to the barn: Brennan named Entrepreneur of the Year | Daily Headlines

POTOMAC — Betty Brennan may have grown up on a farm in Streator, but switching to a career in regenerative farming is still an adjustment for the co-founder and ex-president of Taylor Studios, a Rantoul-based firm that designs and fabricates exhibits for museums and parks across the country.

“I was like my dad’s gofer,” she explained. “Like, ‘Go get this tool, go get that tool.’ I didn’t learn the nuances of running a farm. … It’s a really diverse skill set from animal husbandry to botany to agriculture. It’s a lot to learn.”

Brennan’s latest project, the 250-acre Bluestem Springs Farm, is located in Potomac. She is currently contracting with a more conventional farmer but hopes to integrate more regenerative practices in the future, such as integrating cover crops, reducing chemical use and implementing more crop rotation.

As part of her first steps toward regenerative farming, she has added sheep and plans for them to be pasture-raised, rotationally grazed and grass-fed. She is also considering adding other livestock in the future.

Brennan’s work also includes building prairie, taking care of her forest, removing invasive species and planting native flora.

And, if she ever needs a break, she can take a ride on one of her horses.

In some ways, Brennan felt like she’d been out of the public eye since she “went off to the farm,” so she was surprised to learn that the Parkland College Foundation had selected her as the 2024 recipient of its V. Dale Cozad Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

The award is presented annually to an individual who “demonstrates the best traits of entrepreneurship, including being a leader, a self-starter, willingness to take risks, drive, perseverance, discipline, confidence, a strong worth ethic and passion.”

Recipients are celebrated in partnership with the founding members of the college’s Entrepreneurial Program.

The move to farming might seem like an odd choice for someone who previously ran a business for over 30 years, but Brennan described it as a “natural transition.”

“Taylor Studios, we taught people nature,” she said. “So it was a lot of natural-history exhibits, a lot of working with nature centers. We did a lot of exhibits on wetlands, woodlands, prairie, which is what my farm is.”

She also said that her longtime desire to be an entrepreneur likely came from growing up on a farm, which is a small business in its own right — and, much like a company, has its fair share of risk.

Brennan founded Taylor Studios with her now-ex-husband, Joe Taylor. The couple met when Brennan was a teen. Even then, she was taking business classes and had dreams of making it onto Inc. Magazine’s list of the 500 fastest-growing companies.

The couple both went to Southern Illinois University, and Taylor got a job with a taxidermist in Murphysboro.

“He got a job making trees for a nature center, and so then we realized there was a whole industry,” Brennan said. “There was a whole group of people that built museum exhibits for museums.”

Taylor later got a job with Chase Studio in Cedarcreek, Mo., which was part of that industry. Meanwhile, Brennan finished her MBA and started another business writing interactive computer programs for museums.

Eventually, they decided to join forces to run their own business and started Taylor Studios on a farm in Mahomet in 1991. They later moved to a building in Rantoul as the business grew.

Jason Cox, vice president of operations at Taylor Studios, said he first met Brennan in 1998 when he was a college student looking for work. He’s been with the company ever since.

“It has been an amazing pleasure working with Betty all those years and getting to know her even on a personal level,” he said. “She’s been a wonderful mentor and just a very special friend.”

Cox said he was always impressed by Brennan’s work ethic, as well as her commitment to customer service.

For instance, the company once heard from a client that the $10,000 model they had made of a large swordfish was not scientifically accurate. Brennan promised that the company would fix its mistake, even though it would be a financial hit.

“She knew that it was going to hurt us as a business,” Cox said, “But she was like, ‘This is the right thing to do. We have to do it,’ and stood behind the name of Taylor Studios, stood behind the product and just didn’t blink. And that is a specific thing that stuck with me early on that made me want to stay here.”

The company’s work has included creating a 2,500-square-foot poppy field at the National World War I Museum and Memorial in Kansas City, Mo., and a life-size woolly mammoth for the University of Illinois Natural History Building.

Brennan said in a 2021 interview that the company had created and produced over 700 exhibits in 30 years for clients such as museums, parks, universities and large corporations. Their work spanned 45 states and four countries, she said.

This includes work closer to home, such as multiple projects for the Urbana Park District and its Anita Purves Nature Center.

Judy Miller, former environmental program manager for the park district, said Taylor Studios was one of the first exhibit firms she encountered that was interested in working with smaller clients.

“No matter the size of the project, she wanted Taylor Studios to do the best job,” she said of Brennan. “Better than anybody else.”

“Her sheer drive and work ethic, setting goals and then the amount of effort she put into achieving those goals was very impressive,” Cox said.

The company achieved Brennan’s dream of making the Inc. 500 list in 2000. It has also been on the Inc. 5,000 list twice, and Brennan made the magazine’s list of top 100 female founders in 2020.

She eventually bought out Taylor completely and continued to run the business for several years.

“I loved it; it was my baby,” she said. “But I think — it’s the first time in human history we’ve got four generations working together. And I think that kind of became a little harder, to understand what the younger generations needed and to just get a group of people moving towards the same vision and working together to get there.”

The pandemic was also a stressor, she said.

In exploring possible succession plans, Brennan had, at one point, thought that members of the company’s leadership team might be interested in ownership.

“That didn’t work out, and so I decided it was time for me to do something else,” Brennan said. “And so I put it in with a … mergers and acquisition firm, and they marketed the company and found a buyer that would not flip it and would use my leadership team.”

Brennan sold the business to Innovative Companies Inc., part of New York-based Proviso Capital, in late 2021. She stayed on as president briefly before stepping down in the fall of 2022.

Brennan then took a year to “figure out what was next,” after leaving the company.

“I sort of paid attention, after I left Taylor Studios, to where my joy is, and it’s taking care of animals and nature and being outside,” she said.

Brennan is proud of her time at Taylor Studios and feels the company has had a positive impact.

“I’m trying to do that again, make a positive dent in the world with the work that I’m doing,” she said.

Brennan will be celebrated at Parkland’s Entrepreneur of the Year banquet, which will be held Thursday the I Hotel and Illinois Conference Center in Champaign.