Tom Corwin
The Augusta Chronicle, Ga.
WWR Article Summary (tl;dr) The “Make Startups” program is a new effort to help entrepreneurs launch and scale their budding businesses. The program will be run through “Clubhou.se”, a business and technology incubator housed at the Georgia Cyber Center.
Augusta
For Juana Burt, the dream is a veteran-oriented trucking brokerage. For Tonia Gibbons, it is expanding the public relations work she already does.
Both have ideas for a start-up company that could come to fruition under a new program that will begin soon in Augusta but spread to major cities across Georgia in the months ahead.
The Make Startups program is through the Clubhou.se, a business and technology incubator housed at the Georgia Cyber Center, and is being initially funded through a $250,000 Partnership for Inclusive Innovation grant from Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan.
The program seeks to build on lessons learned from previous efforts to help entrepreneurs launch their fledgling companies, “and trying to see the barriers we were not able to address” before, said Eric Parker, co-founder and president of the Clubhou.se. A lot of that has to do with initial funding, he said. The Kauffman Foundation estimated that 83% of start-up companies cannot access bank loans or capital initially.
Most fledgling entrepreneurs “are typically using credit cards or friends and family money,” Parker said. “A lot of it really comes down to the capital piece, as well as providing consistent ongoing structure to support the entrepreneurs beyond the class. That’s why this one has a very strong mentorship program that goes for six months once people finish the class.”
Burt, an Army veteran whose company will be called TruVet Logistics Alliance, has saved some money to launch her business, which seeks to broker truckers with companies that need goods shipped. But she can certainly benefit from other aspects of the program.
“Originally, I didn’t even know all of the tools and benefits that came with this program when I applied for it,” she said. As a mother of three small children who has also been earning her master’s in business, Burt will also benefit from another adjustment the Clubhou.se made to the training, which went from classes every day to now two nights a week.
“What we found before with our teaching model, there was almost too much content for someone to be able to focus on their business,” at the same time, Parker said.
That kind of schedule “would be difficult for me, as a mother and also someone who is working in the daytime,” Burt said.
For Gibbons, who went from working for Augusta Mayor Hardie Davis to striking out on her own for public relations and consulting, it is about the business side of things.
“That stuff is not my forte so then you have to get people on your team who can help you stay focused and stay on track and be accountable in all areas and not just the ones where you are strong,” she said.
That is part of what the program instills in the entrepreneurs: you can’t do everything, Parker said.
“What we try to do is to teach you enough so you can manage all of these things being done,” he said. “It’s not that we expect you to become a CPA as part of this. We don’t expect you to become a web developer as part of this. But you will know what you need to manage an accountant, to work with a web developer, and so forth.”
Outside of the initial class that begins this month in Augusta, the program will partner with other programs to offer the training in other Georgia cities: with Creative Coast in Savannah, Zane Access in Atlanta, Spark Macon and Startup Columbus. Those classes will launch in August.
Beyond a company, Burt is hoping that her effort can bring others into her business.
“I want to create an organization that focuses on inclusion for other people such as myself who are transitioning from the military to the civilian world, mothers who don’t have a lot of experience because they’ve been getting their education or they’ve been at home with their children,’ she said. “I just want to help other people.”
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