2016 Women's Small Business Month Webinar (Archived)

Welcome and thank you for joining today's webinar. Let's celebrate Women's Small Business Month together. Get tips for starting or growing a small business. And with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Erin Andrew, SBA's assistant administrator for women's business ownership. Erin, please go ahead.

Wonderful. Thank you so much. And thank you to everyone on the phone. I wanted to just say a big happy Women's Small Business Month. I know every month should be Small Business Month for women. And we just really, we're really happy with all the great work women entrepreneurs are doing. We've seen a huge growth in the number of women entrepreneurs in the US And I think we're going to continue to see that increase as the years go by. So just thank you to all on the phone who are accessing the resources available through the Small Business Administration. And we hope that we can be helpful as you not only start, but you also grow your business. I want to start out by just saying the agenda. We're going to really just go over an overview on women entrepreneurs, what the stats are, and this is slide number two. And then we're going to give you an overview of the SBA programs that are available to you. The capital programs, the programs focused on innovation, the programs focused on contracting, and those focused on counseling. And then I want to leave it for questions because I know we get a lot of questions from folks just how to use these programs, what's working, what's not, and how specifically you can leverage the U.S. small Business Administration to help with your business. So just an overview on women entrepreneurs, slide three. Today, women make up about 36.3% of all non farm U.S. business owners here. And we've seen a gigantic growth. We've seen almost a 27, 27.8% growth since 2007 in the number of women business owners in the United States. And I also like to point out that we've seen a huge growth with Latina business owners. We've seen an 89% growth with Latina business owners and African American women business owners. We've seen about a 69% growth. So it's very encouraging the growth that we've seen in the US And I think one challenge that still exists for a lot of women entrepreneurs is actually growing their business and creating jobs. We do know that roughly 90% of all small businesses, that's about 90% of all small businesses don't have employees. So there's an opportunity to really look at getting more women to think about Expanding and growing their business and hiring more people as they continue to contribute to the American economy. There are about 9.8 million women owned businesses in the country today. And as I mentioned, it's about a 27% increase since 2007 in terms of receipts, generating about 1.4 trillion in receipts, which is really, really great. That's just kind of an overview. I want to now talk a little bit about the programs available and I'll go into detail about these programs and the three programs we really focus on. But I added innovation in there. But we usually say at the sba, we say the three C's. We have access to capital, access to contracting, and then access to counseling. On the capital side, we have a 90 billion portfolio of loan guarantees through roughly 5,000 lenders. So we do loan guarantees. We also have 2.6 billion in gross capital available. That's debt and equity capital available through small business investment companies. And then one that's not on here is we also have a microloan program which is $50,000 and below. And I'll talk a little bit more about that in a minute. We also work in the federal contracting space. We ensure that 23% of all federal contracts go to small businesses. There is a goal that each agency has that 23% of all federal contracts go to small businesses. And that's roughly 100 billion annually. And as you can see, we have set aside goals as well. A 5% goal for women owned small businesses, a 5% goal to small disadvantaged businesses. That's our 8 program. A 3% goal for Hubzone companies and a 3% goal for service disabled veteran owned firms. And then finally counseling. We have about 14,000 touch points across the country that provide free and at low cost counseling and training. And we serve about 1 million entrepreneurs every year. We have 116 women's business centers. We have 1,000 small business development centers and 12,000 SCORE volunteers. And we have 68 field offices. And those 68 field offices are federal government employees that work with our banks in those local areas with these resource partners to really provide entrepreneurs with the guidance they need to navigate the SBA programs on the ground. So let's start out with the access to capital space. And I mentioned we have our loan guarantee program and then more of a direct loan. We work through intermediaries as well, but it's a little bit more of a direct loan on our microloan side. On the loan guarantee programs, we have what is called the 7A loan. And our 7A loans are working capital loans, those go up to $5 million and they do not with no floor. And then our 504 loans are for machinery and real estate, and those go up to $5 million. After the passage of the Small Business jobs Act in 2010, those limits were increased to that $5 million mark. I will say we have made some changes, and I'm going to talk about that in a little bit to the underwriting of our smaller dollar loans that really has helped women access more financing with SBA affiliates. Next, our kind of direct loan program, our microloan program, which is $50,000 and below. And women make up roughly 51% of our microloan portfolio. On average. Those loans, even though they max out at 50,000, on average they're $13,000 to $17,000. And we have intermediaries across the country that provide those microloans and they're mission based loans. So the credit record, there's a little bit more flexibility with the microloan program compared to the 7A and the 504 loans. And the rates vary depending on, and there are limits within the rates, but the rates vary depending on the actual lender. You can find out more about our loans@sba.gov loans. That's sba.gov loans. The one thing I did want to talk about. If you go to the next slide, this just goes into a little bit more detail for those that might want it. We have made some changes in the underwriting of our smaller dollar loans that have made a significant increase for women in terms of accessing those. We find that women right now, when you look at the industry breakdowns for women entrepreneurs, there's a lot in the administrative services, in the healthcare industry and other industries. And as I mentioned, women make up about 51% of our microloan portfolio, less than 20% of our 7 working capital portfolio. So there's sort of a gap in the marketplace. So over the course last few years, we've really been looking at how to make changes to get more of the smaller dollar loans out into the market. And that's really benefited women because oftentimes a woman might get, you know, a 25, a $49,000 loan and then need to maybe just access 100,000 or 150,000. But for banks, oftentimes because they have to pay a fee and because there's also a fee to the borrower to use the SBA guarantee, there's more of an incentive to do fewer larger dollar loans. So what we found was if we were able to do A reduction in that fee and zero out that fee. There was more an incentive to actually get some of the smaller dollar loans out into the market to support women entrepreneurs and others trying to access capital to sort of fill that gap. Since those changes, and if you go to the next slide, slide number seven, since some of those changes, and these are some additional changes that we've made, we've seen a 42% increase in the number of loans to women entrepreneurs. So we continue to look at how do we really help those that are trying to access the SBA loans and where have some of the challenges and barriers existed? We had a credit scoring tool that we introduced. We also introduced the linc and you have the link there that you can go to sba.gov tools linc and this is our administrator likes to say kind of the match.com for lending. So it allows SBA lenders to put themselves on link and then potential borrowers can access Lync and they can be connected with those potential lenders. So it's just another opportunity. And for women entrepreneurs, this is, you know, access to that network is always, can sometimes be a challenge. So this just kind of helps alleviate a little bit that access point, allowing them to do it online at any time. And then we also have SBAOne, which is a single platform that streamlines SBA's core services, making it easier for our lending partners to process loans and hopefully speeding up the time to process those loans. And then I mentioned the fee reductions and we've seen a really positive impact of those fee reductions on women specifically, as well as other individuals accessing SBA loans. So let's go ahead and move to the next slide. And so SBA and the access to capital space, not only do we just do debt, we also have debt and equity. And our Small Business Investment Company program is the largest fund to funds program in the country. And we essentially provide funding, matched funding.

To.

Investment, you know, to investors who are trying to get capital into the hands of entrepreneurs. And that can be through straight debt, it can be convertible debt or it can just be straight equity. So this is a little bit of an overview of our SBIC program. It's just another tool in the toolbox and it's very much focused on those high growth entrepreneurs. So it might be, and we talk a lot about whether it's E Commerce IT related. There are some industries that sometimes it can be harder to get an SBA loan in because of the collateral requirement. And the collateral requirement sometimes can be an investment in software or another thing. So the SVIC program is a great opportunity for those high growth companies really trying to get investment elsewhere and might not be able to get the loan guarantee or even just a conventional loan from the bank because of the collateral requirements. So that's just another example. Let's move to slide number nine, which is sort of the innovation. And I snuck this into our three Cs because I wanted to mention some of the other services that SBA provides and that are available to women entrepreneurs. On the innovation space, we've been doing a lot and we've really worked with our SBIR program and the SBIR program, we work with different agencies across the federal government and roughly 3% of their research budget is set aside to put out as a grant to small businesses trying to meet the needs of that specific agency. So an agency will have a need that they'll put out and they'll advertise it, and people can apply for the SBIR grant, which starts at $150,000, and it's a three phase grant process, and respond to that need with the solution they have as their business. So that's one second our cluster initiative. We've been really working with supply chains to identify how to support small businesses, especially tier 2 or tier 3 suppliers, and larger cluster organizations, industry cluster organizations across the country. And so we've been providing contracts to cluster entities to really support and help small businesses, especially in those industries where it's hard to compete as a small business, whether it be the defense industry or the energy industry. And what we do with our cluster program is these different entities help figure out how to bring costs lower, which whether it's shared lab space that they'll pay for for a group of small businesses trying to test their technology. That's one example. And there are a number of other examples depending on the industry, where cluster initiatives really support small business. And finally, in the innovation space, accelerators we've invested and that number has since increased. We are close to, I believe, 150 accelerators that we've invested in nationwide. And we've provided funding to those accelerators. And a lot of them have a specific focus on women and underserved populations as well. Moving to the next slide, contracting. And I mentioned this a little bit and this has essentially we have a 5% goal. And I'm just showing in 2014, our goal was 5% and we were at 4.32% this most recent year. For the first time in 2015, we actually made the 5% goal, which has been really great for A lot of women owned small businesses, I hear often 5%. That seems really low considering that women make up about 30% of the small businesses in this country. And yes, we look forward to doing more and we look forward to kind of exceeding that goal in the future. But we really were trying to meet the 5% goal and working with the different agencies to ensure that we would meet that goal this past year. Additional Resources if you want to learn more about our set aside program for women owned small businesses, we have a special set aside program and different NAICS codes. You can go to sba.govwosb we also have a new portal which is a certified portal for the women owned Small business contracting program that you can find on the SBA.gov WOSB website. And federal government contracting is a really important thing to think about when we talk about contracting. I also like to mention a little like don't only think about the federal government market as a marketplace, also think about international markets. And this is outside of the government contracting, but really looking at not only private sector markets but international markets. We do know that women who have employees on average have revenues of 1.1 million, but women who have employees and export have average revenues of over 16 million. So really look at international markets if you haven't already. Also look at the federal government as a potential market if it makes sense for your business. And then of course those private sector supply chains you can get certified as a woman owned small business. So moving down, we'll Skip over slide 11, moving to slide 12. This is just an example of the network that we have of resource partners under our counseling umbrella at the Small Business Administration. We provide grants to these resource partners. So depending on where you are geographically, if you can't physically get to one of these centers, you can get counseling via phone and video conference oftentimes as well. So that's just an example of the footprint we have across the country. One other thing that I did want to mention, We did have Innovate Her Business Challenge as well out of this office and we are hopefully going to have an announcement on that coming up. I'm not going to get into the details of that on this call right now, but we are looking forward to our third year of the Innovate Her Business Challenge. And that business challenge is really focused on products and services that impact women and working families. And we work closely with different organizations across the country who hold business competitions with the specific focus of impacting women's and working families lives. And we have a national competition sometime next Year, we'll be having a national competition after these local challenges to really highlight the top winners in those categories. So that's just kind of an overview. Some additional resources. If you go to Slide 14, our website, of course, the loans, and then the website for our contracting program. I want to leave it there and go ahead and go to questions. I know we only have about seven minutes for questions, but I know there are probably a lot of good ones. So why don't I kick it back to you?

Ladies and gentlemen, as we move to Q and A, please feel free to place yourself into our question queue by pressing 2 on your telephone keypad. Voiceover Computer users can select the raised hand emoticon from the top toolbar. You will receive a notification when your line is unmuted. At that time, please unstate your name and question. And then again, you can submit any written questions through the chat. And we will get to those once we go to some of the phone ones. I will go to the first caller in the queue. We'll go to the line of Linda Mitchell. Linda, your line is unmuted. Please go ahead with your question.

I'm sorry, I hit the wrong button. You can mute me back. I don't really have a question.

Okay, not a problem. We'll go to the next caller in the queue. We'll go to Shatika Parker. Shatika, your line is unmuted. Okay, we will go to the next column. Acute. Just a reminder, please press 2 if you would like to ask a verbal question to the speaker. We will go to the line of Annette Sterling.

Hi, can you hear me?

Yes, we can.

Hello? Oh, hi. My question is, how is it determined, the value of the loan? Say, if I applied for one of these loans at $50,000 for capital software and things, who determines the amount of the loan and how is that determined?

Yeah, it's determined if you're doing a loan guarantee, if it's a working capital loan to the bank, it's determined by the bank. Oftentimes, they'll ask for your business plan and your budget, and you'll have the ask specifically the amount you need, and they'll look at the collateral you're willing and able to put, you know, to bring to the table. And it's kind of a discussion that way. But the sba, you know, we determine what the limits are of the program. Like I mentioned, it's not going to be above 5 million, and it's not going to be about 50,000 for a microloan, but the bank really works with the borrower to determine what makes the most sense.

So what makes an SBA loan? Is it the backing of SBA that is more flexible versus me just going to a bank?

So if you can get, and I always say this, if you can get a conventional loan, you should absolutely get a conventional loan. The guarantee is there for those loans that just miss the conventional loan bar. You know, a bank might say, here is sort of a risk profile, and this is right below the risk profile I have an appetite for as a bank. I can use the SBA guarantee, and that guarantee will mitigate the risk on behalf of the bank. So it's really to help those right on the margins get that loan.

Okay, thank you.

Yes, thank you.

We will move to the next call in the queue. We'll go to line of Helen Walby.

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes.

Excellent. I'm based in Wales. I've been really interested listening to what you're doing over in America. We don't have anything like the SBA in Wales, and obviously, we are a very small nation. We only have 3 million people. What particular international learnings could we take away from? Your experience of the SBA particularly focused around women?

No, it's a great question. And we talk to a lot of our counterparts. And what's interesting, depending on the country, sometimes there are aspects of the sba, but they're in different agencies across some of these international countries. I think the most popular one, I mean, we get a lot of questions about our contracting program internationally. Sometimes that works in certain markets, sometimes it doesn't. That's definitely one we get questions about. But I think the access to capital piece is really critical. And as I mentioned, I don't think we realized how much of a difference that the incentivizing the banks on the smaller dollar loans could potentially make on women. So I would actually assess, based on the industries where you see more women in your. I mean, it could be very similar to the US it could be different. I don't know. Look at the size of the loan that those industries, on average, might demand depending on which stage of business they're in, and make sure that the capital structures you have in place to provide access to capital match where that need is. Because I think in the U.S. that's something we realized after we did the fee relief. We knew there was a gap in the market, but we didn't realize how significant that gap was, especially for women. So I think the access to capital, and then finally, and I know I'm touching all three c's with it. But we get a lot of questions on the technical assistance piece. I don't think people in the US Always realize and there are a lot to do, but we don't have a big ad budget at sba. We're a government agency. But you can walk into these centers and get free and at low cost counseling and training. So if you have a question about your business plan, you don't know how to do social media and you're really intimidated by it, but it's really important to your business. You're not sure if your financials are right, but you need a second or third opinion that free access to mentoring and counseling and training makes a big difference. So we've also talked a lot about replicating, especially our women's business center model internationally. We've had different countries that have picked that up and really looked at that as an opportunity. So the contracting, depending on the country, sometimes that's popular. Definitely the access to capital, matching the needs of the women in business in your country to those size of loans or size of capital that's available. And then I think that counseling piece is a critical.

I hope that's helpful. Yeah. The Federation of Small Businesses in the UK has done some research around this recently, and two of the key pieces that came out of their research were around access to capital and were around mentoring and support. So it's really interesting that these are two key areas that you think are particularly beneficial in America as well. So thank you very much for sharing that with me. I really appreciate it. And that's something we'll go and look at more. So thank you.

Absolutely. And we're happy to be helpful in whatever way possible.

We do have another caller in the queue. Summer Farrell, your line is unmuted. Please go ahead.

Hi, my name's Summer. I'm calling from Miami. I was calling about startup loans and I guess the mentoring that goes behind researching how to do a business plan. Do you all help with that?

Yes, we do have. Okay, so we do have some online courses. If you go to sba.gov we do have some online training courses and we have a business planner template tool just to get started. You know, you can see if you. If it's what you want to follow. I really highly recommend. You're in Miami, Florida, correct?

Yes.

I recommend going to our local SVA district office and then also they can guide you to the best resource partner locally for you or even just going directly to an SBA resource partner. They're all under local resources on our sva.gov website. A lot of times they have, actually, I think almost all of them have classes on how to write a business plan. They can sit down and go over your existing business plan. They can give you templates depending on what stage you are. So that's, that's my recommendation, is to really use that help and use some of the templates that are there because they're pretty strong templates.

Excellent. Okay, well, thank you.

Thank you. Do we have any more in the queue? Because I have another point I forgot to make.

We do, but if you want to go ahead and make that point and then we'll come to another caller on the line.

One point I forgot to make when I talked about our small business investment company program. It's the debt and equity program. We recently actually last week came out with a report that looked at those funds in the small business investment company program and looked at the makeup of gender and other demographics and looked at how women who received funding from SBIC funds were doing. But then also what was interesting and what we found, two really key takeaways. One, if you have women fund managers or women in some place in that funding team, they were more likely to invest in other women. So that was one takeaway. And the second takeaway is women that received funding from our sbics performed just as well as their male counterparts. So those were two key findings that I just think is really important when you talk about the venture and equity side of things and how women are doing. That report was very telling and I think was a really great opportunity because the SBIC fund data was much more transparent because it's a public. They're receiving public funding that it helps break down sort of the opaqueness in the investment space sometimes and provides some really telling results for women entrepreneurs and also women in the investment space. So I'm ready for another question.

We'll go to the next caller in the queue. We'll go the line at Jennifer Sullivan.

Hi.

Yes, I have worked for the same employer for about 20 years, and I just come to realize that I'm ready to have my own small business. I'm actually interested in a company that's already developed and has a customer base and I think with some improvement could really grow. But never having been involved in a small business, I'm not sure where to start as far as getting the capital needed to fund the sale and have the cash capital on hand. I've been hearing I need like a 30% down payment, which I just didn't know if there's any Way around that. I mean, you don't need 30% to buy a house. I can't see needing that much to buy a business either. And I just didn't know if there was any alternatives to that.

So my recommendation is really to talk to your SBA district office. I mean, we do use the SBA guarantee, you know, can be used and has been used to acquire for M and A and acquire small businesses in the past. And that is a possibility. You don't necessarily. Might not be a direct down payment from you. It could be the collateral. It could be other collateral that you could have, real estate, other things that really. It's an individual case by case basis. It depends on the size of the loan, the industry, and the appetite of the bank. And so my other recommendation there, and this is something we've seen a lot, is you want to find a bank who understands the industry and that you feel you have a good relationship with. We sometimes, you know, for example, in the government contracting space, we had a woman business owner who had a contract from the federal government, but she couldn't, like, she couldn't find, you know, she couldn't find someone to lend her the money. A bank wouldn't lend the money because the collateral wasn't there, and they wouldn't look at that government contract as collateral. And so she had to find a bank that understood the federal government contracting space, and she found one and she got funded and she was able to get the contract. So I just, I say that because I think different banks understand and have a different comfort level depending on the industry, and not all of them, but it just, sometimes it can vary and depending on the expertise of the loan officer as well. So my recommendation would be to look at the industry you're in, talk to the SBA district office, get their recommendation on banks that might make sense, that might understand that industry, and then also talk to them about a resource partner, someone you can sit down with to get everything together to make the case for that sale. Before you go directly approach the bank, you can sit down and get prepped and make sure you have all the paperwork and questions answered so that you're ready for that conversation with the bank.

Okay, great. Thank you so much.

Yes, thank you.

We will go to another caller. We'll go the line of Elizabeth Cranford.

Hello, my name is Elizabeth Cranford, and I'm calling from Illinois. My question is, is there an opportunity to get access to replayment of this webinar? And how do we do? So you want a copy of the webinar. I believe that we will have a copy of this that we can send out, correct, Jamie? Yes, it will be distributed. Do you go onto the website? Will we be able to go onto the website to have access to it? The SBA.gov website? I believe it will come out as an email to all the participants. I'm not sure if it will go up on the website or not. I know it will come up. Everyone who's on this call now will receive an email with the link, correct, Jamie? Yes, I believe so. Okay, that will be great. Thank you so much. That will be very beneficial to go back and review what we heard so we'll know how to access it on the sba.

Thank you.

And I mean I know we've got a ton of people on this call, but I'll go ahead and give my email address out and I will try to answer as quickly as possible, but I can connect you with the right folks. My email address is eriner A N D R E W with no S at the end. So like steal the ESPN reporter but with no s. So aaron.andrewba.gov, and I, you know, we're an advocate for women entrepreneurs here. So if you have questions or you're not able to connect with the right person locally that you want to connect with, we will be as helpful as possible. So please contact. Any other questions.

We will go to the next caller in the queue. We'll go to the line of Cecilia Lalundy.

Hello, can you hear me well?

Yes.

Okay, thank you. My name is Cecilia Lalinde. Can you let us know a little bit more about the Microloan, please?

Yes, the Microloan. So we work through intermediaries. So we provide the funding to intermediaries and those are local mission based loans, lenders that are nonprofits. And the microloan is $50,000 or below. And like I mentioned, on average it's $13,000 to $17,000. The interest rates, we have kind of a limit on the interest rates, but there's a little bit, they can be a little bit higher than our 7A because they're usually looking at a little bit of a higher risk profile sometimes, not always because they're mission based and it very much depends on the intermediary to set those. So if you go to the SBA.gov loans website, you can find the list of those local intermediaries in your area. If you don't see one in your area or if you don't see one in your state, please contact The SBA district office, like I mentioned, if you might not need the microloan, you might want to look at the 7 loan. And because it's easier to get that working capital loan at a lower dollar amount now, it might make sense. If you are able and your financial profile lends itself in that direction, you could get a 7A loan close to the same amount as a microloan. It just very much depends. So my recommendation is to talk to the district office about what your needs are for your business and what you're looking for. And they can help put you in touch either with a micro lender or also a 7A lender, that might make sense.

Okay, thank you. If you don't mind, I have another question, please. How do we have access to the counseling that you mentioned before?

So if you go to our website again, sba.gov, there's a local resources tab at the top of the page, I believe, I think it's at the top of the page. And you click on that, you can put your state, and you can find your state. And what will be listed is the district director, and that is the district office is an sba. Those are SBA employees, federal government employees on the ground. They can help point you in the right direction, maybe to the right resource partner you should go to. But it also lists out all of those resource partners, those counselors that we provide grants to locally. So you can go directly to one of those as well, their phone numbers and email addresses. So feel free to reach out. And we provide the grants. A lot of times in your local community, you might recognize the organization that hosts that grant for our Small Business Development Centers. There are universities and colleges and community colleges for our women's business centers. They're nonprofit organizations that oftentimes provide additional wraparound services for women. SCORE is our mentor network. And they not always, but sometimes and often. Actually, oftentimes can be co located at the SBA district office. And those are folks that want to give back and have owned a business at some point and provide mentoring and help based on their own experiences. Help a business owner who's trying to start or grow. And then our veterans business outreach centers actually are very focused on the veterans population and what they'll do. If you are a veteran, I highly recommend going to a Veterans Business Outreach center because they can guide you in the right direction and help point you to the right resource partner as well based on your needs. And also talk about some of the other programs that are available at the SBA for veterans and at other agencies. I hope that helps.

Okay, thank you very much.

We will move to the next caller in the queue. We'll go the line of Ella Carter.

Hi, Ella.

Good afternoon. My name is Ella Carter and I'm calling from the Atlanta metro area. You mentioned earlier a place that we could go to get templates and things.

Regarding business plans and things like that.

And I missed that information.

Can you give that to us again, please? Yeah, absolutely. So there are two places. Go ahead. If you want to just start out on your own and look@the sba.gov website, we have some online courses available. There's a little training portal on the SBA.gov website. There's a training tab, and there is a business planner template that we have on the SBA website. So that's kind of maybe the first place to start if you're just trying to gather information. Once you kind of collect your thoughts and you have an idea of what you want to, you know, what you want to start and, you know, try to pull some notes together for that business plan. The resource partners that I just mentioned before to the earlier caller have classes on how to write a business plan. They also provide templates. They can work with you and sit down on one on one counseling if you've already written your business plan and you need to talk through it. So I would look not only on the SBA.gov website, but also once you've done that, please meet with one of our SBA resource partners, and that's on the local resources tab on the SBA website.

Okay, excellent. Thank you so much.

No, thank you.

And Erin, before we go to the next call in the queue, we have had a couple people chat through. If you could please repeat your email address.

Oh, yeah, and if I get. I know we've got a ton of people on this call, so I'm going to try to respond as soon as possible to all your emails. It's Erin E R I N Andrew A N D R E W. So Erin Andrew, with no SBA.gov and if you can't find what you're looking for on the SBA website, let me know. And if you are trying to connect and you haven't heard back or weren't able to connect with a local partner, please let me know and we'll follow up with all of that. And if you have questions on government contracting and access to capital, we can kind of connect you with the right people.

Okay, great. And for all those connected on the web, we have sent the email address through the Announcement. So you have that as well. We will go to the next caller in the queue. We'll go to the line of Sarah Stitt.

Hi, Sarah.

Hi.

Can you hear me? Yes, I can.

Okay, my question really has already been answered because I was looking for a copy of the if I would be able to get a copy of the webinar that we're currently in. And you've already answered that and you've also given me the email address. So I have information that I was wanting. So thank you so much for this.

Wonderful. Yeah. Well, thank you and good luck and let us know what we can do to be helpful. I do want to mention this because I do get the one search term we get at sca. The number one search term firm always is grants. Do you have grants for small businesses? And I just want to answer that really quickly too, for folks on the phone. We do not have grants. We give directly to small businesses. Some local governments do do direct grants. There are some foundations and nonprofits. We at SBA do not have direct grants. The only grants we have are the ones that we provide to those resource partners, the Women's Business Centers, the Small Business Development Centers, SCORE and the, the Veterans Business Outreach Centers. But we do have loans. So there it's debt. It's either the Microloan or the loan guarantee or the SBIC program in terms of capital. I just wanted to let everyone know.

That.

And I think, and also thank you all for your time. I know we were supposed to end at 3:30, but we're going to go close to 4. If there are enough questions, we want to make sure we answer all of your questions.

We will go to the next caller in the queue. We'll go to the line of Jackie Hightower.

Hello.

Hi, Jackie. How are you?

I'm well.

How are you?

Good, thank you.

I am in Dallas, Texas, and I have a question about there are a lot of, you know, homes that need to be refurbished and utilized. Now how do you go about getting all that information together to qualify for what is the maximum for that kind of a loan to flip houses to refurbish and make them safe again?

So that's a question I would sit down with a resource partner. I mean, you're gonna, it would be a business refurbishing and flipping. And I would, I would sit down with a resource partner in the Dallas, Texas area. We've got a really good district office there. Reach out to them and ask them which of the resource partners in that local area specifically works in the real estate Space, potentially flipping houses. And if they have some good counselors, for example, business plans. Or there could be some courses. It depends. The research partners really design courses locally, depending on the local need. So there might be courses in that space, but it's really kind of an individualized thing. So you'd have to sit down, lay out your business plan, think through the market you're looking at. You can do some market analysis online. The types of homes, kind of what your margins could potentially be, Pull some of that information together, do the homework. And then I would talk to our resource partner and figure out who's done it in the past and who could potentially be helpful with finding some holes in that plan or figuring out the best way to find funding for that type of business.

Okay, now, in Dallas, where would the resource be? I'm in North Dallas, close to Addison and Richardson.

Yeah. So if you go to local, it's the top. If you go to SBA.gov right at the top, it says local resources. On the website, they have a map of the United States. You hit on Texas, and then it lists. And I don't know, we have. In terms of Dallas, actually the Dallas Fort Worth district office, it's at 4300Ammon Carter Boulevard. But all of that information is on the website, and their phone number is there, as well, as well as the Google Maps directions.

Okay, thank you. A lot of my questions have already been answered.

Good, good. We're here to answer questions. We want. We want other women on this call to be successful as they start and grow their business. So we want to answer your questions.

Yes, this has been awesome, and thank you so much.

Oh, thank you. Thank you for all you're doing.

All right, we will go to the next caller in the queue. We'll go to the line of Priya Castore.

Yes, thank you.

Hi, Priya.

Hi, Erin. Thank you very much. I really very much appreciate all the service you guys do from SBA for women. My question is, if I'm in the service industry of professional and management development training, that NAIC code, which means that it's like coaching, mentoring for leadership development, etc. How many requests do you get from the federal government for these sorts of things? I mean, do you have a good market for this?

That. Honestly, I wish I could answer that question. I don't know off the top of my head. What I would do is you can find where the potential opportunities are and see how many are listed within your specific NAICS code. If you go to Sam. But I would start out with sba.govwosb and it will list sort of where you look. And we also have. I also want to mention this. On the government contracting side, we do have an online training course. It's the government contracting classroom. So there's some specific online training courses to get you ready to figure out what the market potentially could be, how to find the buyers in the federal government, which entities like which federal government contacts can kind of help you navigate and find the agencies you should be targeting for your specific NAICS code. So my recommendation for you and for anyone else looking at government contracting is to please go to sba.govwosd, take the government contracting online classroom courses available, and then see what information is there. Those portals and directories are listed on that website. Okay.

And then so this is. How would I know which entities are looking. Is there a website that actually lists all the people looking for services such as this?

Yes, that is on here. I'm going to give it to you right now. If you go. I just wanted to make sure. If you. It's on. I'm trying to find really quickly. If you go to the portal, it's right here. If you go to SBA.gov, it lists you right to that directory.

Okay. Okay. And if I have any questions, do you have like an email? Not your personal email. If I have just standard questions. Is there any place we can go for like info helpba.gov or something?

Yes, you can go. The website is actually on that website too. Oh, perfect. Yeah. If you have specific questions at government contracting. I mean, if you email me, I'll put you in touch with those folks. But there is a website. On the website I just gave you, there is an email address.

Okay, that sounds great. Thank you very much, Erin. I appreciate it.

Yes.

And Erin, we do have one last caller in our question queue. We will go the line of Alice Johnson.

Hi, Alice.

Yes, thank you so much for your conference today. And someone just answered my question, so I really appreciate it. So thanks again.

Oh, great. Wonderful. And on the government contracting side, I just want to mention I didn't want to give you the wrong address. If you go to www.sam.gov, that's where the opportunities are located. But that is on the website, the sba.govwosb. but I didn't want to give the incorrect email address or web address. But it is there and it's actually under one of the first PowerPoint presentations on that website. That kind of tells you what you need to do to get into government. Any other questions we do have one.

Last question that just came through. We'll go to the line of Jackie Duran.

Okay, great.

Hi, can you hear me?

Yes, Hi, Jackie.

Hi, how are you? I'm Jackie Duran and I'm in Miami, Florida and I am trying to start a business, but I'm running into a couple of issues. I don't know how to figure out what kind of business to start. The type as far as a C corporation, an S corporation, an LLC or all that other good stuff. Along with that, I also am ex military and I am a woman. And I don't know, are there specific programs that are geared for women like me that could participate in both programs or do I have to choose between a woman development program or being a veteran?

Wonderful. Well, first, thank you so much for your service. We really appreciate that. To your question, in terms of the type of business, I don't want to give you counseling on the phone right now because I don't have all the specifics. So I would, I would sit down with one of our resource partners on the types and look at the benefits based on the type of business in the industry you're in and what you want to get out of it. I mean, you can do obviously the research online, but if you're still kind of questioning, I'm not sure I think I should do this. I think getting a second opinion and sitting down with a resource partner is what I would do if I were in your shoes. Number two, we love that we have women who are also veterans and there are programs. We have programs. The women owned small business contracting program, the set aside program is for women. We have a service disabled veteran owned small business set aside program for veterans. I always say in the government contracting we can double, triple, quadruple count. So I kind of call it the unicorn. If we have someone who qualifies under the service stable Veteran owned small business contracting program, the women owned small business contracting program, the HubZone program, and the 8 program for a contracting officer. They get to count all those goals with one contract. So I just, I do point that out for folks doing government contracting, if they're trying to decide to do one or not to do another, it can be helpful in that regard. But I would also sit down with a resource partner with your district office to get guidance on that in terms of which resource partner to go to. Our women's business centers support and help out a lot of veterans, as do our small Business Development centers and our score chapters, our veterans business outreach centers. We have 19 of them, so they're not. Sometimes they're more difficult to get to, depending on where you're located. And honestly, I have to remember I don't have a map in front of me. If there's one in Miami or not, you can.

No, it is not. I'm on SBA.gov and I'm looking at the map. The only thing we have is resource partners at the SIU School at International University.

Great. So this is what I would recommend. In your case, the veterans visit the Outreach Center. Sometimes they're in other states, but they cover that region. And those folks that are in the veteran business Outreach Centers do a lot of traveling. So you very well have someone who comes down to Miami. I would reach out to the local district office and explain that you're a woman, you're a veteran, you want to be connected with the Veterans Business Outreach center, if there is one in the area. But then also, which resource partner would you recommend that I go to? As I'm starting my business, I want to maybe take a class on the type of business to see or I need to sit down with someone. I've done some research and I have some existing questions on should I be a B corp? Should I be an LLC and ask the district office and you know where they would send you based on kind of the information you give them? That would be my recommendation to you. And I would also. We also have. If you go to our website, there's a zwise, which is V W I S E the Veteran Women Igniting the Spirit of Entrepreneurship. Sorry, we have a lot of acronyms in the federal government, but it is a specific intensive entrepreneurship training program for women veterans. So you. Actually, Jackie, I would look into that, too. It's a great program that we do at sba and we have different cohorts throughout the year in different parts of the country. So that would be something to look at as well.

Okay. You said it was. Because I'm writing it down, but you were going to quit. Veteran Women Igniting the Spirit of Entrepreneurship.

So I would just say it's V dash W I S E. And we have a veterans page on our website as well. It's SBA.gov veterans and it has the V rise link there. But that's a great program if you're a woman veteran.

Yes. Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you so much for everything. Ms. Erin and everybody else, thank you so much. You guys have given us a lot of information. Oh, good.

Well, thank you so much. Thank you for all you've done. I think that in terms of questions I know we ran over, but I just want to say thank you to everyone for being on this call, for doing what you're doing, for looking at entrepreneurship as an option or for looking how to grow your business. We really appreciate the women entrepreneurs we have in this country and we really need you. I think you're sort of the population in this country that's really going to carry our economy. So we are here at SBA to help you. Go to SBA.gov we have a lot of the resources that I mentioned. Please email me, go to our website, let us know what we can do to help because you don't have to go it alone. I know it's a messy process. It's not always perfect when you start a business and it can be a little chaotic. But do know that you have support in the Small Business Administration. So I think with that we'll end the webinar and thank you all so much and Happy Women's Small Business Month.