ANDOVER, Kansas, September 17, 2008 – Vaughn Huslig appeared on “The Big Idea with Donnie Deutsch” back in March. His idea was a colorful carton to fundraise Vic’s Popcorn. Deutsch approved.

Huslig and his wife Kristi moved to Kansas from Omaha to be closer to their family.

When searching for a business opportunity, they thought about their favorite hang-out in Nebraska – Vic’ Corn Popper.

There were no franchises. So, they negotiated to license the name and learned Vic’s gourmet popcorn secrets.

Business wasn’t immediate.

“You think that you just open it, and they will come,” Huslig said. “There's a lot more to it that I think that we might not have been prepared for. We've had our ups and downs.”

The Husligs needed about $75,000 to get Vic’s opened and until now, they’ve subsidized the growing business.

“We kinda had to nurse it along for the probably the last two to three years, but I think we just celebrated our four-year anniversary in July and we're meeting our numbers in the business plan -- our break-even number now.”

Vic's corn popper has become quite the place for the Andover Central Middle School crowd to come after school. But the new found business is not quite enough for Vaughn and Kristi to base expansion plans.

“The popcorn, and hang out with friends, no teachers, and the food,” one student said.

About 50 percent of its business is retail, 40 percent is corporate with custom packaging. And they hope to exploit a growing area of business – fundraising.

“The fundraising is a niche that is totally un-tapped and it's a real affordable fundraiser for the schools,” he said.

Thirty to 40 percent of their annual business if from the Christmas season – at the time they double their work force to 10 part-time workers.

“The most is the caramel chocolate -- it's like gold at Christmas time,” he said.

The Husligs hope to expand to the west side, but not anytime soon. In the meantime, they’ll focus on the Andover location.