Arkansas Entrepreneurs Take Flight
By Madeline Martin on Thursday, March 20, 2025
Bo Cunningham always had a passion for photography and videography. When he bought his first home at the age of 19, he discovered a need for better photography in real estate listings. Bo learned that almost all home searches begin online and that poor images of a property often hurt the chances of a listing being seen.
“I decided to talk to my buyer's agent as well as others to see if this was actually a problem,” Bo Cunningham said. “The answer was yes. While there were some competitors in the space, everyone had an issue that was either based on quality, timeliness, customer service or a combination of the three.”
This experience inspired Bo to launch his own business – Arkansas REM, a real estate media company that serves Central and Northwest Arkansas. The company is dedicated to helping clients get accurate, high-quality photography and videography for their property listings.
While Bo came up with the initial idea for the business and currently handles most of the day-to-day operations, his partner Allyson Loter was instrumental in establishing the company’s foundation. She designed the company logo and branding, and she manages the company’s social media pages and website.
While in the early stages of building the business, Bo and Allyson entered the Arkansas Governor’s Cup, a business plan competition for college students. It was a struggle to balance a full-time business and a full college course-load, but they won first place in the small business category, which included a prize of $10,000.
“I realized that being a full-time business owner was most of the preparation I needed for [the] Governor's Cup, as it gave me a unique perspective that most competitors did not have,” Bo Cunningham said.
Bo learned early on that the key to entrepreneurship is focusing your efforts on what you’re good at and delegating the rest.
“Luckily, I found a company that focuses a segment of its business on working with specifically real estate media businesses,” Bo said. “Now, I have to do minimal work at a minimal monthly investment and I get to see all of my reports, financial statements and forecasts all neatly shown in QuickBooks.”
The biggest financial lesson Bo learned is the importance of running a debt-free business. He knew he didn’t want to burden himself early on by taking out loans, so he figured out a different way.
“What I decided to do instead was work with what I had and let my clients pay for the rest as I begin to do work,” Bo said. “This did two things. First, it motivated me to work hard to serve more clients so I can serve them better with better equipment. Second, it helped me be more intentional with financial decisions knowing that it was my money leaving my bank account, not someone else's with a promise to pay back.”
The Arkansas Governor’s Cup is a collegiate business plan competition founded over two decades ago by Arkansas Capital Corporation. Its mission is to give a unique educational and networking opportunity to college students who might be interested in becoming small business owners.
Through the competition, students are fully immersed into what it takes to launch a startup from the ground up, facing common challenges that small business owners encounter and gaining feedback from volunteer judges — most of whom are Arkansas-based entrepreneurs, small business owners and large corporation executives.
Interested in competing? Learn more about the competition here!
