Jillana Sauder – Savor and Grace – Sidney, Nebraska

Let me introduce you to Jill, an entrepreneur with a start-up business called Savor and Grace now located in Sidney, Nebraska’s downtown creative district. Jill is pursuing her dream, building community, and among a growing group of nascent Nebraska entrepreneurs being helped by the Nebraska Small Business Assistance Act.

How can one describe Jill’s business Savor and Grace? Savor and Grace is rooted in cheese, ever popular charcuterie boards, and so much more. Jill produces what she calls Graze Boxes, employing unique and healthy foods. Just over a year old this western Nebraska small business started in a former bakery on the edge of town with only pickup space, and now a prime retail location in the former Sam and Louie’s brew pub and pizza shop. This new location provides space for dine-in customers, pickup, and events. Jill provides specialty foods, but core to her marketing strategy is providing an experience where food and friends can enjoy life and good times. Jill envisions adding more offerings including salads, soups, catering, cheese boards for parties, and events. Her son loves Harry Potter and Hogwarts. So come Halloween 2024 expect Savor and Grace to become a little Hogwarts, celebrating Halloween, in the downtown.

Behind every new startup small business is an entrepreneur. Jillana (Jill) Sauder is that entrepreneur for Savor and Grace. She grew up south of Sidney across the Colorado border in her childhood hometown of Crook (2023 population of 123). She, like other rural youth, moved away settling in the Denver Front Range metroplex. She created a living providing business coaching services for larger growth businesses nationally. As a single mom, she and her son would often travel together coaching businesses on systems and company culture. In time Jill moved to Sidney and took root in this rural community of 6,425 residents. Sidney is a regional trade center community for a rather vast rural region including parts of Nebraska, Kansas, and Colorado.

Determination and creativity are two key entrepreneurial success traits. She has both in spades. Jill’s friend encouraged her passion for cheese boards and desire to open a brick and mortar. She was looking for a way to make a living, but also a path to friendships and community building. When she moved into her new downtown location, customers, now friends, offered labor to help her with renovations and moving. A quick conversation with Jill demonstrates her love of small-town life in Sidney and her desire to give back. Jill’s entrepreneurial journey in this rural community is just starting, but given her dreams and expansive ideas, more is likely to come as the years unfold.

Some less than humble entrepreneurs state… “they are self-made.” Jill is quick on the other hand to talk about all those who have helped her in her business startup. There are so many who contributed to her success in both formal and informal ways. There was the owner of that bakery on the edge of town leasing her building to a yet unproven entrepreneur. There was more formal assistance provided by the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center hosted by Western Nebraska Community College, located on its Sidney campus, and business planning support provided by the Nebraska Small Business Assistance Center. E3 – Energizing Entrepreneurial Communities pitched in helping find solutions and network to resources. Sarah Sinnet, a leader with E3 and Alisha Juelfs, E3’s Sidney and Cheyenne County Entrepreneur Navigator or “eNavigator” worked with Jill helping her make important connections. Sidney E3 is a network of people and organizations committed to helping entrepreneurs like Jill. Another E3 leader Melissa Norgard, co-owner with her husband of Boss City Brewery became involved. Boss City Brewery needed a new and larger location, this E3 informal networking resulting in Melissa working with Jill to become the new occupant of this prime downtown location.

It was through Alisha and E3, that Jill learned about the Nebraska Small Business Assistance Act (NBSSA). Jill was now working with Scottsbluff based Starr Lehl with GROW Nebraska on an application for a startup business grant. This funding helped her with the purchase of equipment essential for her required commercial kitchen. Jill is clear, without this assistance she would have found a way. But she also makes the point that with this help, including the grant funds from NSBAA, it has made a huge difference in getting into the new location creating more business opportunities sooner. Since the start of NSBBA thousands of Nebraskans have made inquiry about assistance. This is a strong indicator of startup entrepreneurial energy in the Cornhusker State. In time, hundreds of Nebraskans, like Jill will be helped through this innovative program. Good luck Jill and congratulations on Savor and Grace.