2014 LITHF ENTREPRENEUR WINNER

Andrew Hazen

Andrew's business ventures began as early as 2nd grade when he would 'trade' three quarters for a dollar bill at sleep away camp so fellow campers could buy ice cold drinks from the soda machine, which didn't yet accept dollar bills. Then as an early teen, Andrew figured out that he could take ordinary Champion sweatshirts, twist them up and squirt them with bleach and abracadabra it became a "hip" design that sold for 100% more than the original sweatshirts! Fast forward to 1996 when Andrew discovers and becomes obsessed with the World Wide Web. While attending law school in Michigan, Andrew teaches himself how to optimize websites and get them to appear on the first page of search engines. When he wasn't in class, Andrew registered hundreds of domain names and built his first online venture; LazyStudents.com. With his self-taught "secret sauce," Andrew had LazyStudents.com ranking within the top 3 of every major search engine for a search query on 'terms papers' or 'research papers' and was receiving 15 – 60 orders a day! At that point Andrew knew the law degree was beneficial but practicing law was out for now…. In 1999 Andrew literally married the girl across the street and having known Andrew his entire life, Heather knew what she was in for; or so she thought! Having three beautiful boys within six years didn't hold Heather back, she ran credit card orders in the middle of the night during feedings, oversaw two home construction projects, drove countless car pools and went to a gazillion birthday parties while Andrew worked 90+ hour weeks. Andrew's extraordinary passion, drive and perseverance coupled with unconditional love and support from Heather, his sons Spencer, Dylan & Oliver, his parents Lois & Michael, in-laws Arlene & Mel, family, friends & mentors enabled him to start Prime Visibility in 1998, which twice made the Inc List of Fastest Growing Companies in 2007 & 2008. Andrew sold the business in 2007 to private equity investors and he continued as CEO until the company was sold again in 2011 to a public traded company. From mobile billboard trucks to delivering bagels and building online tutoring platforms to storing medical records online; Andrew has created numerous businesses on Long Island and created hundreds of jobs. Andrew is currently the Co-Founder & CEO of Angel Dough Ventures (a startup seed fund), Co-Founder & CEO of LaunchPad LI (Long Island's first and largest business accelerators with 12,000 sq ft in Mineola and 8,500 sq ft in Huntington), Co-Founder & CEO of AllBobbleheads.com (the world's largest retailer of custom bobbleheads) and Of Counsel at Ruskin Moscou Faltischek where he is actively involved in the newly-formed Digital Media practice group. Andrew also serves on the Board of Directors of the Long Island Angel Network, LISTnet, the Digital Advisory Board at St Jude Hospital, the Eric Trump Foundation and rockCANroll.org