A lot of people say they’re “happy to help”, but you’ll have a hard time finding a person that lives that statement more than Ben Pearson, Founder and CEO of ENALAS.

“We built most of our business by helping companies,” Ben says. “We help them with data analytics, with product design and we help manufacturers go right from manufacturing to end-user.”

ENALAS is a family affair. Ben says that his family motivated him to work for himself. He opened the doors in 2012 and now has 46 employees. Ben’s sister Elizabeth was the one that came up with the name ENALAS, pronounced en-ale-us, which stands for Everyone Needs A Little Assistance Sometimes. Ben’s dad Doug was his first hire. He joined the team after spending 30 years at Kodak.

A Thriving Business

ENALAS has been on Rochester’s list of Top 100 fastest growing companies in the region for the last 4 years.

The Victor, NY-based company works with clients to help them navigate online marketplaces, manage warehousing and global logistics, and handle product design and development. In today’s world of e-commerce, Ben’s company helps its partners optimize their processes and smooth out operational challenges.

Some regional and national brands that ENALAS has assisted in gaining better exposure include Perfect Granola, Red Jacket Orchards, NeuLog, Eisco, Once Again Nut Butter, and Country Sweet BBQ Sauce.

One of ENALAS’s clients was having trouble with their e-commerce, so Ben’s team rebuilt their e-commerce platform. “They produce a great product. We did some testing on photography and copy and used analytics and data to optimize it,” Ben says. “We built a system to manage all that information. We do the testing then we sync up with Walmart.com, Amazon, Shopify, Etsy, and more. The information is all in one place and we sync it out at once. It’s all within our tech stack.”

This process is one of the ways they help the brands they work with. “We analytically test what the marketing should be to represent the product to end-users. It’s completely data-driven. That process and information feeds the tech stack and populates all the data into our universal database,” Ben explains.

Ben says that Victor is a great place to do business. “Lots of land and open space and our employees really love the proximity to walking trails. A lot of employees take lunch breaks at the nearby park.”

ENALAS’s location in the Finger Lakes region is useful because they’re surrounded by forward-thinking organizations that are increasingly setting up shop in order to tap the region’s strong infrastructure opportunities, its highly educated local talent pool, and its wealth of environmental assets.

“I truly believe we are in one of the most advantageous geographical areas in the world,” says Ben. “It’s also a pretty good tax bracket business-wise,” he continues.

Ben also notes proximity to the freshwater supply that the Finger Lakes provide, an ability to experience all four seasons, and a variety of different shipping corridors as reasons to love living and doing business in the Finger Lakes.

Founded in the Finger Lakes

Ben began his collegiate career at Monroe Community College, went on to the University at Buffalo to obtain his undergraduate degree in mathematical physics, and then did graduate work at the University of Rochester, where he received a master’s degree in theoretical physics. After a stint in corporate America, Ben returned to the area to develop ENALAS, which today boasts a portfolio of almost 10,000 unique products that are sold in 110 countries.

“Figuring out how to get those products into end-users’ hands has everything to do with data,” Ben says. A big part of his physics training was learning how to analyze data— “physics is all data,” Ben remarks. He says that his analytical physics skills have translated into how his business operates today: using big data to ensure that a company’s products find the most opportune buyers.

So how did Ben turn a love of combing data into building a host of different product offerings?

“I really like making stuff!” Ben says with a smile. “I’m a physicist by trade. What we did at ENALAS is build e-commerce channels as the first part of the company’s development. Then we focused on helping people with their needs.”

Ben still collaborates with his alma mater, the University of Rochester as well as other regional higher education institutions like Rochester Institute of Technology and Finger Lakes Community College (FLCC). “A big part of our business is designing scientific equipment and the local schools are great to test that and give us feedback.”

But Ben doesn’t just collaborate with these institutions on technology. He also cares deeply about supporting burgeoning entrepreneurs that are graduating from those schools.

Investing in the Finger Lakes

Ben hopes that young people in the Finger Lakes region—whether they’ve grown up here or have come to the region to attend college—stick around to begin fulfilling careers.

“We’re really interested in hiring students that come out of FLCC. We’re looking for people on the technology, e-commerce, and coding side of things. We find that this area is flexible and talented people are able to be trained really fast. I really like the community college network. Folks come out of these programs ready to work.”

Ben was active with the YEA! (Young Entrepreneurs Academy) program at FLCC. He mentored students in the program and most recently sat on the Investor Panel for the competition and contributed some seed funding to the startups. LOCATE Finger Lakes was proud to underwrite the YEA! program at FLCC and Cayuga Community College (CCC) thanks, in part, to financial support from Lyons National Bank.

Ben is also a board member for Special Touch Bakery, a Rochester area wholesale bakery that employs individuals with special needs in its commercial kitchen to cook, bake pies, and more. When Ben talks about Special Touch, his face lights up. “That is an amazing place! It’s incredible what they do.”

ENALAS really takes the concept of “help” to a whole new level and it seems to be ingrained in everything they do. “Each quarter, a percentage of our profits go back into charities that are advocated by and for our employees,” Ben says. “We encourage our employees to speak up for the causes that they find important so we can give back to them.”

Ben’s company also pays 100% of its employees’ health insurance premiums and their dental costs. He adds that the company also offers strong disability insurance “so that if somebody is in a position where they get hurt, we have their back.”

Finding Fulfillment in the Finger Lakes

“It’s interesting to see the investment money moving into the Finger Lakes region,” Ben notes, emphasizing that he sees many folks based in the New York City area now trying to shift some of their operations to Upstate NY and rent or buy space. Ben can see why stating, “it’s a really nice place to be—as well as a great place to start or expand a business.”

Ben says that’s one of the reasons that organizations like LOCATE Finger Lakes are important is because “There is untapped potential and great quality of life here that is unmatched – and it’s a hidden gem – I don’t think enough people know about it.” LOCATE Finger Lakes can help draw attention to the thriving businesses in the region.

“There is a lot of really cool manufacturing going on here that the pandemic helped catalyze,” Ben notes. “ENALAS used to manufacture a lot of our designs overseas, and when the pandemic hit, we were concerned about our supply chain. So we took our designs and looked all over the Finger Lakes and Western New York to see who could help us. The pandemic really changed how we engage some of the smaller machine shops and supply shops—and also how they view business. We now make some really cool products locally that were previously tricky to make in Western New York and in the Finger Lakes area. I think that’s awesome. We really want to accelerate that.”

“The Finger Lakes is a great place to be and it’s a gorgeous place to live,” Ben remarks. “The potential is already here thanks to the proximity to the New York State Thruway and the talent and ideas coming out of the Universities. I want to help keep graduates here rather than see them leave the area.”

Ben says he’s “always happy to help” and he’s walking the walk on that statement with his many regional investments. Learn more about ENALAS at www.enalasgroup.com.

LOCATE Finger Lakes is a Finger Lakes economic development initiative designed to assist and foster collaboration among the established Finger Lakes economic development efforts with targeted, proactive, marketing communications and networking. LOCATE Finger Lakes is focused on directing local, national and international business leaders to Finger Lakes information and inspire them to look closely at the region’s assets enabling their businesses, their families and their employees’ families to thrive.

Maureen Ballatori is a LOCATE Finger Lakes Business Journal contributing writer and a member of the organization’s board of directors. She is founder and CEO of 29 Design Studio, a creative agency for food, beverage and agriculture brands. Ballatori also owns Port 100 Cowork and Metro Collective which helps Upstate NY shared space operators activate their workspaces.