The effort to turn it into a business hub is “a labor of love,” McNutt said.
“The idea is that you’d be able to come in with a crazy idea, and we can help you turn it into a product and make it happen,” he said.
The restoration project would create space for several businesses, including rentable office space, a maker space, a home for the Greene County Student Robotic Center, and food and retail service.
A former Air Force Institute of Technology professor, McNutt specialized in rapid product development, an ethos he plans to build into the Entrepreneurial Center at the Eavey Exchange.
Plans for the first floor primarily include restaurant and retail, as well as a maker space that would be complementary to the Greene County Library. The space would include a wood shop and machine shop, McNutt said, allowing entrepreneurs to create more sophisticated prototypes for research and development products.
The middle floor would in part support the Greene County Youth Robotics Club, which serves 150 children in Greene County across 13 teams.
“Just giving them the opportunity to do stuff is kind of a blast,” McNutt said. “You’ll see them start off with, ‘This is a wrench and this is a screwdriver,’ and then after a couple years, they’re...off to the races.”
The third floor would house the Entrepreneur’s Center, which McNutt says is intended for resources and partnerships he would have found useful as a startup entrepreneur.
“We want to be able to take your idea, help you set up your business, set up your accounting system, get you an office, get you a website, get you some videos promoting it and make you some prototypes,” McNutt said.
Located along the bike path and across the street from Devil Wind Brewing, the Eavey Exchange building is almost 90,000 square feet. Built in 1908 as a grocery store warehouse, it has been vacant or mostly vacant for decades.
The Entrepreneur Center is expected to support roughly 21 relocated positions, 29 new expected full-time positions and 28 part-time positions, some of which are encompassing McNutt’s own businesses.
The building is also near the Hub District project, one of two major redevelopment centers in downtown Xenia.
Part of the funding stack for the $3.7 million renovation includes funds from Greene County’s Community Investment Grant, obtained in partnership with the city.
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