Ary from New Haven is the 94.3 WYBC Lunch Club winner for the month of April 2025! Ary and her guest enjoyed a delicious lunch with Wanda Coppage at D’Amatos Seafood on Whalley Avenue in New Haven!
Want to have lunch with Wanda? Go to our WYBC Contest Page and enter to win!
The Southern Connecticut College & Career Fair is Tuesday, September 30 from 4:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at the Hartford HealthCare Amphitheater in Bridgeport, CT. Head to CTCollegeFair.com to get information on colleges, universities, and businesses attending from all over the U.S. and abroad.
Designed for high schools students and their families, the Southern Connecticut College & Career Fair is the largest college & career fair in the area. Meet with over 200 colleges, universities, gap year programs, and businesses.
FREE event and open to all high school students.
For more information or questions, email [email protected]
WYBC and D’Amato’s Seafood want to treat you and a friend to an in-person lunch with Wanda Coppage from the WYBC Workforce!
Enter to win a delicious lunch for you and a guest at D’Amato’s Seafood, 423 Whalley Avenue in New Haven. We will randomly draw a winner each month and if you win, you and your guest will get to enjoy an in-person lunch with Wanda at D’Amato’s!
Alpha from West Haven is our WYBC Art’s Keyword Grand Prize Winner of a brand-new 50-inch television courtesy of Art’s Television & Appliance, 92 State Street in North Haven!
Here she claimed her prize from Andy from Art’s with Darryl Huckaby from DeDe In The Morning!
Congratulations, Alpha!
Kimberly, working in Woodbridge, is the 94.3 WYBC Virtual Lunch Club winner for the month of March 2025! Kimberly and her co-worker enjoyed a delicious lunch with Wanda Coppage virtually courtesy of D’Amatos Seafood on Whalley Avenue in New Haven!
Want to have lunch with Wanda? Go to our WYBC Contest Page and enter to win!
Connecticut Pizza & Brew Fest with Brown Roofing is Sunday, July 20, 2025 at the Hartford HealthCare Amphitheater in Bridgeport from 12pm to 4pm.
Connecticut Pizza & Brew Fest with Brown Roofing is the ultimate pizza tasting event in the state. The Connecticut Pizza & Brew Fest with Brown Roofing will allow you to sample some of the best pizza and craft beers Connecticut has to offer. Also included will be panel discussions, live music and pizza contesting.
Buy tickets to CT Pizza & Brew Fest here
VIP: Sponsored by Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana
12pm-1pm exclusive VIP hour. Free pizza samples only 12pm-1pm.
$50 per ticket
GA:
1pm-4pm
$10 per ticket
Pizza Trucks:
Beers & Beverages:
Other Vendors:
Presented by
First & Last Name: Dave Austin
Business Name: Westville Seafood, 1514 Whalley Avenue, New Haven
Year Business was started in New Haven: 2008
Why did you start your own business?
In the past, I used to own bars, but I really wanted to own a business that was family oriented.
Why did you choose to start your business in New Haven?
I grew up around the area, so I was comfortable with the neighborhood.
What challenges did you have to overcome in starting your business?
The hardest part was finding the right people to run the day-to-day operations. I had the concept, I had the building, I just needed a good team to hire.
Photos courtesy of Westville Seafood
Name: Krystina Jackson
Business Name: Soulful Threads, 1022 Chapel Street, New Haven.
Year Business was started in New Haven: November 2020. Storefront on Chapel opened on November 15th 2023. We are a new store!
Why did you start your own business?
After graduating with my master’s in social work from UConn in 2020, I like many others lost their jobs when Covid hit. I decided to pick up some side jobs to help cover the bills and selling clothes became one of them. I got great feedback from people saying I had a great eye and its led from one opportunity to the next. I’ve always been a girl addicted to retail, so this was the perfect dream for me to work towards.
Why did you choose to start your business in New Haven?
After considering many other locations, both inside and out of the state, I chose New Haven because of its dedication to progressive change downtown. The culture is growing here, and young people are now looking here as a great place to build a life. No matter who you are, you can find your niche in New Haven. The only thing it was missing was a place for curated 90s/y2k vintage, which is the hole we have tasked ourselves with filling.
What challenges did you have to overcome in starting your business?
In December 2021, I lost my brother and only sibling to a rare cancer that took him within a year of diagnoses. Grief is by far the hardest thing i’ve dealt with. Especially being in my young adulthood. My brother was a computer programmer who helped start the makings of what is now our website. I made it my mission after he died to make Soulful a success and here we are in one of the Shops at Yale 2 years since he passed.
Photos courtesy of Soulful Threads
Name: Sundiata Keitazulu
Business Name: Nate The Snake Drain Cleaning. Call 203-654-5187
Year Business was started in New Haven: 2010
Why did you start your own business?
I learned how to snake drains by doing my mother house and then I started my own business and I named it Nate The Snake because It sounded good.
Why did you choose to start your business in New Haven
I’m from New Haven born and raised in Newhallville.
What challenges did you have to overcome in starting your business?
Finding customers was hard at first. Then we started advertising on Facebook, Yelp, Google and word of mouth helped with getting more customers.
Photos courtesy of Nate The Snake Drain Cleaning
Name: Eiress Hammond
Business Name: MINI PNG, 77 Audubon Street, New Haven
Year Business was started in New Haven:
2022 – storefront
2019 – started making clothing online
Why did you start your own business?:
In 2019 as an 18-year-old, I was going to college for pre law in a whole different state! (Ohio State University) and I felt like the creative side of me was missing that had always been a part of me. In HS I wanted to go to college for fashion design after studying abroad in high school in Europe and getting inspired by fashion in general. BUT I wanted to go to college in NYC. I was told by my HS counselor that the field held no income for me. So, I went for my plan B major which was prelaw. I came back home transferring colleges after my first semester in Ohio trying to figure myself out after a horrible personal experience. I started making clothing and selling it online for fun and for extra money since I couldn’t hold a job with the prelaw program I was in. My designs went viral, and I took a step back from college in 2020 during the pandemic to really focus on what I loved.
Why did you choose to start your business in New Haven?:
My family is from New Haven! My Abuela immigrated from Puerto Rico – Brooklyn with family merging into New Haven. My grandmother went to ACES as a kid and the location of my shop with ACES being right next door was a full circle moment!
What challenges did you have to overcome in starting your business?:
One of my biggest challenges was dropping college. I’m a first gen student in my family (only child) and it was very pushed on me to be the one to follow the road to success “the right way.” I’ve always had support from my family, but it was more of an internal battle and the overall fear of failure/ that what if aspect of veering off the path that’s expected.
Photos courtesy of Mini PNG
