Two students are attending model tryouts for the Iowa State Fashion Show. One leans over to whisper, “It’s your number I really want.”
That’s the moment Claire Kranto (’15) met her life — and business — partner, Webster Kranto (’15).
“He invited me over and cooked for me: traditional Liberian food, collard greens,” she recalls. “We’ve been together ever since.”
“Together” takes on a new meaning for these Iowa Staters. In addition to running their entrepreneurial venture Budu\Bu, a smoke shop and art collective in four locations across the Des Moines metro, they are heavily involved in their community and global outreach.
The couple has facilitated the sale of fair-trade products throughout their stores. They started the Kranto Education Alliance of Des Moines — for after-school programming — and the Kranto Education Foundation, their nonprofit in Liberia providing access to schooling and school supplies. Claire teaches fashion design at Des Moines Area Community College and serves on the City of Des Moines Housing Appeals Board. Webster — whose early childhood was spent in war-torn Liberia and then in the Ghana refugee camp Buduburam (where Budu\Bu gets its name) — has been appointed to the Iowa Board of Corrections. He has served as chair of the Des Moines Civil and Human Rights Commission and on a community task force charged with recommending local and state actions concerning marijuana legalization and decriminalization.
How do they do it all while raising three children?
“The key is to have an equal passion for everything,” Webster explains. “We don’t do something that we don’t have the passion for, and we don’t put ourselves in spaces where we can’t be ourselves.”