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Getting Down to Business

LOREO launches a business club for the Russian community.

Russian immigrant business professionals have a new place to network, thanks to a club created in January by the Local Russian Émigré Organization's (LOREO) Southeast office. The Russian American Business Club, whose members include accountants, doctors, attorneys and other professionals, offers opportunities to share business advice and contacts, promote businesses owned by members of the Russian community and just enjoy each others' company, says Irina Nikishin, LOREO's Southeast coordinator.

"We saw an interest and readiness in the community for something like this," she says. Nikishin and community volunteers have been working toward launching the club since last May. Simon Istakhorov, a real estate broker and vice president of LOREO, is sure of the demand. "The need is there because we are so spread out in

The group's first meeting drew 50 people and featured a guest speaker, a political science professor doing research on immigration. Nikishin says she was pleased with the turnout. "There was so much enthusiasm, we were taken by surprise."

That's why LOREO, a product of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service's Office of Immigration Resettlement, initially was created, says Nikishin. "The idea of the program is to help the Russian community organize itself, establish a presence and have more of a civic and political voice," she explains. They are successful, educated people, but they don't have that cohesiveness."

LOREO also was well represented at Federation's Super Sunday in January, where a journalist from Russian satellite TV taped the event and wrote a piece for a Russian magazine about the business club, Nikishin adds.

Eventually, Istakhorov says he wants the club to be a strong influence in government. "I want every mayor of Atlanta and senator to call us and say, `I need your support in the next election,'" he explains, adding that LOREO hopes to have a few hundred people involved in the club.

Following a February meeting at a Russian restaurant, Nikishin says meetings will be held monthly at the Marcus Jewish Community Center of Atlanta at Zaban Park. For more information about LOREO, please call Irina Nikishin at (770) 677-9347.