Entrepreneurial Fowler Student Inspired by Grandfather Who Survived the Holocaust
“I’ve been an aspiring entrepreneur my entire life,” said Harris Ness, a junior at San Diego State University’s Fowler College of Business. “From selling lemonade outside my neighborhood elementary school to reselling clothes throughout high school, I’ve always known that I wanted to work for myself.”
Harris Ness is an SDSU junior majoring in management information systems
The proceeds of the lemonade stand also made Ness a young philanthropist. “My grandfather and my great aunt were both Holocaust survivors, and my grandfather would explain to me about how he would never give up, no matter what happened, inside the concentration camps,” said Ness. “After he passed unexpectedly when I was still in elementary school, I believed the right thing to do was to donate the money I was making at the lemonade stand to the Holocaust Memorial and Tolerance Center in New York.”
Ness donated hundreds of dollars to the museum from the profits of his lemonade stand. Although he stopped operating the stand long ago, he continued to work as an entrepreneur through high school as a self-employed web designer and a buyer and reseller of clothing.
As he approached the end of high school, Ness took time off from his businesses to fly from his home in South Florida to visit his brother who lived in the Ocean Beach area of San Diego. “My brother asked me if I ever thought of coming to school in San Diego and I told him that I hadn’t,” he said. “He took me onto the SDSU campus and when we walked around Hepner Hall, I knew I had to come here.”
Ness enrolled as an SDSU freshman majoring in computer science in 2018, however, he shifted his major to management information systems (MIS) shortly afterward. “I realized that I wanted to focus more on the business curriculum while maintaining my passion for technology and decided that MIS was the perfect major for me alongside a minor in computer science,” he said. “After switching to MIS, I discovered the Association of Information Technology Professionals (AITP) at SDSU. I now serve as the president of AITP and I could not be more grateful for all the friends and professional connections I have made through this organization.”
Packages shipping from Harris' company, Limeberry Drive, arrive at the post office
In addition to AITP, Ness is also a Lavin Entrepreneur, which is a two-year undergraduate program offered within the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center at the Fowler College of Business. The program is designed “to build the next generation of SDSU entrepreneurs” by offering these students the resources they need to build their business ideas.
Currently, Ness runs a business called Limeberry Drive which combines his love of graphic design with his passion for running a business by imprinting his original artwork onto garments which he then sells.
In addition to operating Limeberry Drive, Ness will work as an intern at Amazon during the summer of 2021 and he plans to continue working at Apple where he’s been an Applecare college advisor for iOS and macOS products for the past two years. “I have been a super fan of every product Apple has released from a very young age and I will hopefully continue my employment with Apple after I graduate from SDSU,” he said. “I also plan to continue running my clothing brand after graduation to further my creativity and knowledge when it comes to running a business.”
Running a business while working full-time will take a lot of time management skills and hard work, but Ness continues to be guided by his grandfather’s work ethic. “My grandfather will continue to be my hero for as long as I live. He was one of the most hard-working people I’ve ever known and his example has served as a blueprint for what success looks like to me,” said Ness. “His influence on me as a person and my work ethic is extremely important and shaped me into the person I am today.”
