Jackie Nguyen turned to friends and GoFundMe and pitch contests to raise money to start Café Cå Phê. The first-generation Vietnamese American started her business as a mobile coffee shop to cut costs until she could find an affordable brick-and-mortar location in the Columbus Park neighborhood.
Difficulties went beyond money, Nguyen said. She and other minority women shared stories on social media about watching others get permits and pass inspections on the first try while they seemed to always run into a series of roadblocks.
"It was really difficult," she said. "It got to the point that I'm texting Quinton (Lucas, mayor of Kansas City) myself."
The challenge of becoming an entrepreneur can be even more challenging for people of color and women, KCSourceLink Senior Director Michael Carmona said Tuesday. Carmona moderated a panel discussion at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation focusing on obstacles facing minority entrepreneurs and programs aimed at helping them break through.
India Wells-Carter, owner of Fresh Factory, said there are many resources in Kansas City for entrepreneurs. But people have to know about them to access them. Wells-Carter said she wasn't fully aware of the FastTrac business planning program pioneered by the Kauffman Foundation even though she previously worked for the foundation. That program led her to others, including The Porter House KC, where she was connected with Nia Richardson, head of the KC BizCare office.
Wells-Carter, whose company features an event space with social selfie backgrounds, said she's honest with aspiring entrepreneurs about what's required. That includes the support from family and friends, as well as business demands. Better that someone sitting on the fence choose not to go forward than to do so and fail because they didn't know what they were getting into, she said.
BizCare, a city office dedicated to smoothing the path for entrepreneurs, similarly tries to take a wide view of the assistance it can offer, said Samuel Morris, policies coordinator. The office works to update city regulations written before anyone ever thought of selfies as a business opportunity, he said. KC BizCare wants to be in position to help cut through red tape and connect entrepreneurs with the resources they need.
"If you don't know what's offered," he said, "you can't take advantage of it."
One big problem is that Black and Latino households tend to have much lower household income, and less generational wealth. Carmona said this makes it much tougher to get loans and other financing.
AltCap CEO Ruben Alonso said his organization and other Community Development Financial Institutions work to offer help to entrepreneurs who can't get a bank loan or traditional financing. He said he's excited about a program to offer revenue-based financing, in which AltCap will let borrowers repay loans through a percentage of future revenue.
He said the program, which will launch next year thanks to a Kauffman Foundation grant, will give entrepreneurs time to pay back loans without hindering the growth of their businesses.
