Sept. 18, 2026–The Craig School of Business at Missouri Western State University presents guest speaker Joe Runyan at 1 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 23 in the Business Education Resource Center, Popplewell Hall room 308. The entrepreneur will present firsthand lessons on building, scaling, competing and successfully exiting entrepreneurial adventures. The talk is free and open to the public.
Joe Runyan is a lifelong Kansas City entrepreneur. After 13 years at Sprint, he founded Hangers Cleaners and grew it into Kansas City’s second-largest dry cleaner. He and his company gained national attention for competing successfully against Procter & Gamble’s Tide Cleaners, with coverage in the New York Times and on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.
In 2014, he co-acquired the CRDN restoration franchise for the Kansas City region and helped build it into a leading restoration company before its sale in 2021. Hangers was sold to Pride Cleaners in 2023. He remains active in Runyan Land & Cattle Company and MOKAN Hemp Farms in Northwest Missouri.
Runyan holds a B.S. in Business Administration with a concentration in Finance from Trinity University and an MBA from the University of Kansas.
Runyan’s talk, “From Startup to Scale and Exit: A Kansas City Entrepreneur’s Journey,” is part of the Alumni & Industry Insights Series by the Craig School of Business.
Missouri Western State University is a student-centered learning community preparing individuals for lives of excellence through applied learning. MoWest is located in St. Joseph, Mo., and is committed to the educational, economic, cultural and social development of the region it serves. Visit missouriwestern.edu.