Image via www.smallbizweekmke.com
Milwaukee’s small business community is an ecosystem of interconnected business owners, employees and customers. There is an understood value in supporting a local business owned and operated by someone who’s a part of the community.
Until recently Milwaukee didn’t have a way to officially celebrate its small businesses. But strides were made five years ago when Mosaic Communications co-founded Milwaukee Small Business Week (MSBW) in partnership with the city of Milwaukee’s Office of Small Business Development.
“Milwaukee Small Business Week is a time for the community to come out and support local small businesses and for entrepreneurs to connect with each other,” Nepherterra Estrada Best, partner and public relations director of Mosaic Communications says. “It’s a time to get together, and hopefully some people walk away with new business opportunities.”
MSBW has grown year after year, going from one small reception in 2012 with around 30 attendees to a weeklong celebration with multiple events every day. Last year there were 12 events with more than 900 attendees. Estrada Best is convinced that this year’s will be the biggest yet.
Mosaic Communications has an office in Charlotte, NC, and that is where the idea for MSBW began. Estrada Best and her business partner, Johnna Scott, questioned why Charlotte had such a robust celebration for National Small Business Week and Milwaukee didn’t have anything.
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This led to a meeting with Mayor Tom Barrett, where Estrada Best and Scott presented what other cities were doing, and their vision for what could be done here.
“In other cities Small Business Week is like Summerfest for small businesses,” Estrada Best says. “It’s a weeklong party for entrepreneurs to network, learn and celebrate ach other.”
The first year of MSBW was like launching a new product, Estrada Best says. They encountered growing pains, such as challenges securing resources and executing events. Getting sponsorships was also a challenge, but they’ve now grown to a point where sponsors reach out to them. This year there are 14 sponsors.
Estrada Best thinks that Milwaukee’s celebration is now catching up to Charlotte and other cities that celebrate National Small Businesses Week on a large scale.
“We’re not where we’d like to be yet,” Estrada Best says. “We’re only five years old, so we’re in the toddler stage, but it’s an exciting time.”
The City of Milwaukee’s Small Business Conference is the highlight of MSBW. The conference predates MSBW, but has since been included in the week’s itinerary. This year Rodney Sampson, who worked behind the scenes on ABC’s hit show “Shark Tank,” will be the conference’s keynote speaker.
A draw of these types of events is their ability to connect people. One successful connection made at last year’s MSBW was between Roy Henning of MOFOCO, a Volkswagen engine company, and Lincoln Financial Corporation.
MOFOCO had been owned by Roy’s father Randy since 1969 and had expanded from a one-stall garage to multiple buildings throughout Milwaukee by the 80’s. Business eventually slowed down in the ’90s as national chains like Autozone and Pep Boys gained popularity.
In 2012, Randy’s son, Roy, received a business loan and bought MOFOCO from his father. While the business loan was enough to cover the purchase and some operating capital, Roy soon found that it wasn’t enough.
Henning attended a MSBW event last year after being invited by Estrada Best, who he has known since middle school. While there, he met a representative from Lincoln Financial Corporation, who eventually helped him secure a $150 thousand business loan refinance.
At this year’s conference Henning will share his success story, but also speak about the difficult process he encountered.
“People tell you that all you have to do is fill out some paperwork, turn it in and then they will tell you yes or no,” Henning says. “That’s not how it works at all. It took me around eight months before my loan process was finalized. The process is not short, and it’s not easy, but when you’re done you know more about your business than you could imagine.”
While not every business finds, or even needs, someone to loan them $150 thousand, other businesses use the event’s networking opportunities to teach and learn from their peers.
Glorious Malone’s Fine Sausage has been in business for over 60 years. It began in the Malone family’s kitchen where they would cook friends and family sausages for holidays. After demand kept increasing, they opened up shop on 6th and Hadley, where they also had a grocery store.
Eventually Glorious Malone became the first African-American woman to become a state and nationally certified meat producer.
After Malone passed away in 2007 her daughter, Daphne Jones, took over the company.
“I knew that I wanted to keep the legacy going, because it’s not just my business, or my family’s, but it’s the community’s,” Jones says.
Jones sees MSBW as an opportunity to show that small and growing businesses matter in a world where large corporations receive so much attention. She also likes to take advantage of the networking opportunities, and learn from other small business owners.
“I think that often small business owners don’t know about the opportunities available to them because they’re so busy working on their businesses,” Jones says.
As an established small business owner in Milwaukee, Jones also wants to use Milwaukee Small Business Week as a way to give advice to younger business owners. “I’ve been given a gift, so I also want to give a gift,” she says.
You can find more information on Milwaukee Small Business Week here.
