Small Business Grants For African American Women – As difficult as it is to get ahead as a woman and a minority in the world, statistics show that black women defy the odds as one of the fastest growing groups of entrepreneurs.
It doesn’t matter that they faced any gender or racial discrimination in starting their own business – they have triumphed.
Small Business Grants For African American Women
In fact, African-American women hold a more significant percentage of all black-owned businesses than women of other races.
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Black women own more than 36% of all Black women-owned businesses, while women own only about 19% of all other companies combined.
They are the fastest growing group of small business owners, showing 67% growth from 2007 to 2012 and 50% growth from 2014 to 2019.
To keep this sector of the economy alive, many organizations have begun offering grants specifically for black women entrepreneurs. Others have long-term grant programs for this group.
The grant was created in memory of Amber Vigdahl, a nineteen-year-old black teen who had dreams of opening her own business.
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Amber passed away before that dream could be realized, but a grant in her honor helps many young women see their business dreams come true.
The Amber Grant awards more than $10,000 monthly to women-led business proposals they deem worthy and $25,000 to an exceptional company.
This organization not only creates the possibility of starting their own business as a young woman through funding, but they also share a lot of useful information on their blog.
The Sogal Foundation is a global platform that states its mission is to “close the diversity gap in entrepreneurship and venture capital”.
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Part of their mission includes providing a grant to Black women so that they can see their dreams of starting a business come true.
SoGal has partnered with Twilio, Winky Lux, 12NYC, and Bluemercury to decide the $10,000 and $5,000 prize winners.
These awardees will have access to the extensive knowledge base and mentors of the SoGal Ventures team.
The team will also help award winners find more funding to grow their business by assisting them with the end-to-end application process.
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Each year the National Black MBA Association (NBMBAA) hosts the Scale-Up Pitch Challenge to provide funding opportunities to its members.
In 2020, all winners were Black women entrepreneurs. So imagine having your name and picture on the list of next year’s grant winners!
IFundWomen has a long list of grant opportunities dedicated to women’s empowerment. Their website also lists a variety of small business grants from other organizations on the web.
A great example of grants earmarked for Black women entrepreneurs is the Visa She’s Next Grant program for Black women-owned businesses. This grant program awarded $10,000 grants to sixty individual small business owners.
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The American Express • IFundWomen of Color 100 for 100 Program is another funding opportunity specifically designed for women of color.
The program offers grants of up to $25,000 to individuals who propose intelligent business plans. In addition, they provide 100 days of resources to 100 black businessmen.
Certainly, the association will review the application to determine the need for the grant and the potential impact on business.
In return, the consortium requests that recipients place the NASE badge on their website for one year after receiving the grant.
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Since the grants offered by the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) vary, it is best to visit their website periodically for current business grant competitions.
To apply for a grant from MBDA, you must first register your business. You will then need to download the application from the Grants.gov website.
MBDA recommends that you attend each grant’s pre-application teleconference prior to writing your application. Doing so will help you better understand grant requirements and increase your chances of success.
The Build Your Legacy Grants by Essence and PineSol provide the opportunity to award $100,000 to a Black female entrepreneur.
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The grant also comes with six months of business mentoring with successful businesswoman Nicole Walters. Additionally, her website features video lessons useful for any woman running a business.
FedEx is a big enabler for small businesses. Among the many grants that they sponsor with other companies and organizations, they have their own grant contests with large prizes.
They award the first place winner of their grant competition $50,000 for their small business and $7,500 for FedEx printing services.
The second place winner receives $30,000 in FedEx printing services along with $5,000 and the third place winner receives $15,000 along with $1,000 in FedEx printing services.
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Many small business owners are so intimidated by the seemingly complicated process of applying for federal government grants that they miss out on a lot of financial aid.
The government must have caught on to this timid response of many businesses as they have created a wealth of grant writing tips and advice on their online learning center.
You can read articles and even watch YouTube videos to help you understand the process and build up your courage to apply for these grants.
Grant application can be tedious and discouraging if you apply for many grants over the years without success.
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It takes determination to keep going, and the more you try, the better your chances of winning.
Still, you can improve your odds of becoming a grant recipient and funding your for-profit business through more than just a numbers game.
When you search for grant opportunities, you can get ahead of yourself and probably feel hungry at the sight of prize money.
However, if you don’t take the time to read the grant requirements carefully, you could end up wasting your time applying for a grant you’re not even eligible for.
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Sometimes you may not qualify at the time, but only need to become a member of the organization or make some small changes to become eligible.
For example, many grant contests will ask you to answer a few pertinent questions to help you determine the viability of your business and the goals you want to achieve with the grant money.
If you fail to answer any one of these questions, they will not have enough information to make an appropriate decision.
While you want to give them a clear and concise answer, you also don’t want to leave out a good reason why they should give you this grant money.
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It would be a shame to miss out on a grant just because your font was wrong or your envelope was too small.
If you can’t convince the judges that you believe in the value of your business, how will they consider it worthy of a grant?
Providing visualizations of your data is a great way to get your application in the eyes of a judge. This can be in the form of a graph, table or chart that highlights the strengths of your business.
Not all small business owners are great writers. Even those with higher education can find writing a grant proposal a real challenge.
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As the best voice for your business, you should be actively involved in writing your proposal. That said, there is no harm in hiring a professional grant writer.
This helps ensure that your proposal is free of grammatical errors and typos. It will also improve the flow and coherence of your submission.
If your proposal is well written and concise, you have a better chance of winning the grant competition.
It’s great to be a dreamer, but organizations don’t pay just because the company has big dreams.
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Your proposal should be reasonable and there should be strong data to support your plans. All grant judges will want to know how you plan to use the money and what you hope to accomplish with the extra money.
Don’t overextend yourself by making tall promises that you can’t keep. Many grant applications are rejected simply because the proposal is too implausible.
For example, nonprofit organizations are more likely to award their grants to a business that shares the same values as them.
If you are a small business that provides technology services, you should look for an organization in your area that offers small business grants.
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The more aligned you are with the company or association, the better your chances of being one of the grant recipients.
Even if you don’t have a common bond, you can still benefit from researching who is running the company or association. Then tailor your submission to better address that point.
Another way to increase your chances of making the final cut is to look at grant recipients selected in previous years.
If you do your research well, there’s no doubt that you’ll find a common thread among past recipients. You can use this knowledge to identify what grant judges look for and how you can be the next winner.
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A study completed by BCG and MassChallenge revealed that women entrepreneurs have access to less venture capital and yet deliver higher revenues.
Despite having a more challenging time securing a small business loan or other form of funding, Black women entrepreneurs will continue to be successful.
Granted (slight play on words), the more help they get, the more likely they are to succeed. The greater their success—the more valuable their services and goods they can offer to the world.
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