Local Business Development

Five Ideas from Detroit

smitchell — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 12:52:37 -0600

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to spend a day in Detroit meeting with local entrepreneurs and sharing ideas for spurring small business development. I came away feeling that Detroit has quite a bit to teach the rest of us about how to build a local economy from the ground up.

Detroit is an enormously challenged city, beset by high unemployment, a population that has shrunk to a mere 40 percent of what it once was, and large swaths of abandoned houses and vacant lots.

Grassroots Financing is Underwriting a New Crop of Neighborhood Businesses

smitchell — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 12:17:08 -0500

Securing a loan to open a new independent bookstore in Brooklyn looked like a long shot even before the financial crisis. After the meltdown, it seemed downright impossible. Then business partners Jessica Stockton Bagnulo and Rebecca Fitting hit on an idea: they turned to neighbors and future customers to help finance the business, raising $70,000 in small loans over a few months. Just as CSAs have played a key role in the rebirth of small-scale farms, so too may these new community-supported enterprise models help launch a new generation of independent grocers, bookstores, and other neighborhood businesses.

Banks and Small Business Lending

smitchell — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 07:58:23 -0600

This article was originally published on Huffington Post as part of a partnership with their Move Your Money campaign.

Banking consolidation was constricting the flow of loans to small businesses long before the recession. So it's no surprise that the money taxpayers have spent over the last sixteen months shoring up big banks has done nothing to free up credit for small businesses.

To do that, we need to focus on expanding the capacity of small banks to lend to local businesses that have, as a result of the recession and through no fault of their own, become riskier investments. A key issue is whether the Senate will quickly reauthorize a critical loan-guarantee program.

New Tool Helps Low-Income Communities Evaluate Food Retailers

smitchell — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 14:59:49 -0500

The newly published Sustainable Food Retail Framework aims to help cities struggling with a lack of grocery stores in low-income neighborhoods better balance the need to quickly fill the gaps (a mandate that often favors large supermarket chains) with the advantages of fostering development that delivers more long-term stability and greater economic, community, and environmental benefits (a framework that favors local business).

Pennsylvania Seeds a New Crop of Local Grocery Stores

smitchell — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0500

A new, independently owned grocery store has risen in the place of what had been a run-down, sparsely stocked market in the small town of Williamsburg, Pennsylvania (pop: 1,345).

Two hundred miles away, another new independently owned grocery store is opening. This one is in a low-income, African-American neighborhood in North Philadelphia, which has been without a supermarket for ten years.

Meanwhile, one of the oldest farmers markets in the country, which has operated in the center of Lancaster since the 1730s, recently took steps to stay in business for years to come by upgrading the systems in its 19th century building.

All of these projects were made possible by the Pennsylvania Fresh Food Financing Initiative, a four-year-old, statewide grant and loan program for grocery store development.

Community-Owned Stores

smitchell — Thu, 01 May 2008 10:05:45 -0500

The success of the Powell Mercantile has inspired at least half a dozen other towns in Wyoming, Montana, and Nevada—all too small and remote to interest national or regional chains—to open their own department stores. The concept is now spreading to the much more populous Northeast, where local residents are seeking communityfocused alternatives to big-box retailers.

Austin Initiative Connects Local Businesses with Developers

admin — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 00:00:00 -0600

Two years ago, retail developers in Austin, Texas, began meeting with the AIBA, a coalition of some 300 locally owned businesses, to talk about ways that they could work together to bring more independent businesses to both neighborhood and downtown redevelopment projects, as well as new shopping centers.

The developers reported that, largely because of AIBA's buy local campaign, their market surveys were finding that residents wanted to see more independent businesses and fewer chains in their projects.

The problem was that the developers did not have a way to find local entrepreneurs looking for space. Most developers work with national and regional leasing brokers who have rolodexes full names like Starbucks, Blockbuster Video, and Barnes & Noble. No similar mechanism exists to connect independent business owners with developers.

97 New Bookstores Opened in 2006

admin — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 00:00:00 -0600

According to newly released data from the American Booksellers Association (ABA), 97 new independent bookstores opened in 2006.

The 2006 openings followed the launch of nearly 90 bookstores in 2005.

"2005 was the first year in memory that there were a significant number of new store openings," said Oren Teicher, the ABA's Chief Operating Officer. "From the mid-1990s until then, you could count the number of new bookstores that opened each year on one hand."

Jane Jacobs on Locally Owned Businesses

admin — Fri, 28 Apr 2006 00:00:00 -0500

Astute urban observer and activist Jane Jacobs died this week at the age of 89.

Among her many accomplishments, she mobilized her neighbors and led several successful grassroots fights in the 1960s that saved Greenwich Village, Soho, Little Italy, and the Lower East Side from being leveled for glass towers and an eight-lane highway dubbed the Lower Manhattan Expressway.

Funds Launched to Aid the Gulf's Independent Businesses

admin — Tue, 11 Oct 2005 00:00:00 -0500

Local business owners across the country are coming to the aid of their counterparts in the Gulf Coast by establishing funds to provide direct assistance to independent businesses affected by the hurricanes.

One fund has been set up by Small Business California, in partnership with several statewide and local small business groups. Working through the Louisiana Business & Industry Association and the Baton Rouge Area Foundation, the fund is providing grants to small businesses affected by the disaster.