Launched in 2009, Going Back to College Day provides a yearly opportunity for Half Century Trojans to visit campus during a typical school day, engage in a stimulating array of academic, cultural and spirit-related activities, and reconnect with fellow alumni and various constituencies within the university.

For more information, please e-mail Alexander Barrera or call him at (213) 740-5944.

Please enjoy our photo gallery from last year's event.

Kathy (Keeler) Seid ’80 can’t pop into a dry cleaner’s, step onto a golf course or set foot in a doctor’s office without sensing untapped potential.

“There’s just not any place I go that I don’t see an opportunity,” she says.

Seid is enthusiastic about a new product that she and her husband, David, created out of their printing business: the MiniBük. The pocket-sized books are proving popular as a tangible and clever way for businesses and individuals to market themselves. Customers are using the format to create compact how-to guides, industry primers and product explainers.

“It’s little and cute, but people are intrigued by how much focused information you can get in a small package,” says Seid, who has printed 200,000 MiniBüks since starting the venture in 2010.

Drawing on skills she learned majoring in marketing at the USC Marshall School of Business, Seid doesn’t miss a chance to spread the word. She has engaged potential customers in elevators, on airplanes and at museums.

“When I took our dog to the vet,” she says, “I sold her on the value of doing a MiniBük about the importance of dental health for pets.”

Hailing from a family of entrepreneurs and Trojans (“I was indoctrinated very early,” she jokes), Seid entered USC as an accounting major but switched to marketing after a life-changing class taught by the late Ralph Carson. In 1947, Carson co-founded the Carson/Roberts agency, which grew into Los Angeles’ largest advertising firm until it merged with Ogilvy & Mather in 1971. He later founded USC’s Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies.

“I don’t think there was a person in the class who wasn’t inspired by him,” Seid recalls. “His passion about business, marketing and advertising was infectious, and he made you feel you could be successful at whatever your passion is.”

She and David launched their printing business in 1985, publishing mainly software manuals until a customer made a special request: He wanted to print a very small book. David, the engineer of the operation, made it happen, and they soon began offering the minibook to other clients. It took off.

Customers have ordered MiniBüks on topics ranging from social media to event planning to emergency preparedness. They’ve used the books as table favors at fundraising events and as ski-trip guides, complete with maps and roommate assignments. The IT company Oracle recently used MiniBük as part of a nationwide direct-mail campaign, and a trio of authors hired by Facebook wrote a miniguide on using Facebook for teaching and learning.

And Seid convinced USC alumnus John McKinney ’74 - co-founder of the USC Hiking Club and author of several books about hiking - that MiniBük was the perfect size for his new trail guides, starting with Hiking 101: Great Trails and Beach Walks Surprisingly Close to USC.

Entrepreneurship, Seid says, “is not for the timid or shy. You must wear many hats and network all the time. You need to be a multitasker and have a team of competent people behind you.”

Even 30-some-odd years later, the enthusiasm modeled by Carson still fuels her. “He had fun with being an entrepreneur,” she says. “And that’s what I’m having.”

On his business card, Brandon Stauber MPP ’95 identifies himself as “Agent White.”

Relax. He’s talking about wine.

In 2007, the 41-year-old oenophile launched The Wine Spies LLC, with partner Jason Seeber, who goes by “Agent Red.” The company’s ecommerce site (thewinespies.com) sells a different wine each day, offering wine lovers a “confidential wine dossier” on each daily pick. Dossiers include a review, an interview with the winemaker and background information on the vineyard. Featured wines, produced in small quantities and usually not found in grocery stores, are sold at a discount for one day only.

“We came up with the concept of ‘spying out’ family wineries and introducing them to a wider public,” Stauber says, explaining his company’s cloak-and-dagger conceit. The website plays the espionage theme to the hilt. Members are called “operatives,” and they can earn “spy points” by contributing wine reviews, inviting friends to join or buying wine. As they accumulate points, operatives can be promoted to “field agent” or “station chief,” making them eligible for special promotions and gifts.

The Tom Clancy-esque trappings of the site reflect its founders’ belief that wine should be fun, not intimidating. “The ultimate goal is to make wine accessible, to get it off the pedestal and into the glass, where you can enjoy it,” Stauber says.

Since going live, the site has attracted nearly 30,000 members, and its 2010 sales were about $1.5 million, according to Stauber. It moves 15 to 25 cases a day, with most bottles selling between $20 and $50.

The Wine Spies is the second entrepreneurial venture for Stauber, who credits USC’s Master of Public Policy program at the School of Policy, Planning, and Development for teaching him the strategic thinking necessary to succeed in business. “It’s given me a framework for looking at challenging problems and finding effective solutions,” he says.

In 1999 the Los Angeles native, who also holds a B.A. in public administration from San Diego State University, launched an online event-management firm. After selling that company in 2004, he worked as a business consultant. In 2006, a friend from the Sonoma Valley asked Stauber to write a business plan for a venture exporting California wines to Europe. Although that business never got off the ground, the friend - Seeber - partnered with Stauber to create The Wine Spies.

It remains a small enterprise, with Stauber and Seeber the only full-time employees. An operations whiz, Stauber works remotely from his Exeter, N.H., home, while creative guru Seeber oversees marketing from the company’s Santa Rosa, Calif., headquarters.

Sharing an equal passion for wine, the partners personally taste and review each vintage they sell, Stauber says. If one of them doesn’t like a wine, they won’t sell it.

“We’re actually taking a lot of time with each wine to try to give it its due,” Stauber says. “Every wine has a story, and winemakers are in the business because they have a particular skill and passion for a product. If we can reveal what that passion is, then we’ve done a good job.”