Thursday, March 28, 2024 In 2018, Lauren Coleman started The Sursy with the vision to build a bespoke hospitality brand that owns, designs, and operates a portfolio of unique properties across the Southwest. She owns the White Swan Motel in Lakewood, Colorado (to become Loveland House Hotel) and Mellow Moon Lodge, Rodeo Mercantile, and the Moon Bar & Lounge in Del Norte, Colorado. Before becoming an entrepreneur, Lauren worked for a technology start-up and an experiential marketing agency. Additionally, she comes from a family of entrepreneurs, with her dad encouraging her “business brai ..read more

Thursday, March 21, 2024 On March 15, Small Business Majority network members, alongside other small business owners and advocates, attended the White House’s inaugural Regional Small Business Summit. The entrepreneurs met with U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman and other Biden-Harris administration officials to discuss how to help Main Street thrive. Over the past three years, a record 16 million new business applications were filed with outsized growth in women, Latino, and Black entrepreneurship. However, there are still many barriers that prev ..read more

Monday, February 12, 2024 With a master’s degree in computer science, another master’s degree in information systems and an interdisciplinary PhD, Lisa Kaczmarczyk never planned on becoming an entrepreneur. After working in the tech industry as a developer, she transitioned into academia as a university faculty member teaching computer science where she also gained experience obtaining grants from the National Science Foundation. Lisa thought she would be doing this type of work forever. However, after over 15 years in academics, in 2011, she founded Lisa Kaczmarczyk PhD Consulting, LLC, whi ..read more

Wednesday, December 20, 2023 While Leo Carr began his career in sales at Philip Morris, he “always had the bug to own my own business.” In 1999, he started his entrepreneurial journey and bought Express Personnel Services, a franchise staffing company. Leo had the opportunity to act on his passion, which was to fill a need by helping small businesses with their workforce needs while also helping people get jobs. This has given him unique insights into how small employers can meet the moment in addressing their staffing needs.  He now serves as Executive President at the Elite Group, an ..read more

Monday, October 30, 2023 Sisters Lakila Bowden and Kamille Richardson are reframing disability and disproving myths that providing accommodations for differently abled employees is expensive and burdensome to businesses through their consulting company, iSee Technologies.  Lakila and Kamille started their small business out of necessity. While Lakila found herself on a traditional path after college, joining the ranks of corporate America, Kamille–who was born blind–struggled to find a career. Kamille ended up in the field of massage therapy after facing rejection when applying to corpo ..read more

Thursday, October 12, 2023 On September 26 and 27, Small Business Majority hosted an advocacy fly-in event, “Small Business Speaks: Two Days in Washington with Small Business Majority.” Nearly 30 entrepreneurs from the organization’s national and state Small Business Councils attended the event to build community and ensure that federal policymakers heard the true voice of small business. To kick off the event, Small Business Majority provided these small business owners from diverse industries and backgrounds with an advocacy training on how to best tell their stories in order to support sm ..read more

Thursday, September 7, 2023 In 2022, Small Business Majority, in partnership with Support Latino Business and Modern Woodmen Fraternal Financial, awarded critical funding to three Latina business owners through their annual #SupportSmallBiz grant program. The grant program bridges the gap in small business funding for Hispanic and Latino businesses, which often face challenges and systemic barriers in getting the capital and resources they need to start, grow and expand their enterprises. Ahead of the 2023 #SupportSmallBiz grant, now in its third year, we chatted with the 2022 grant award rec ..read more

Friday, August 11, 2023 On July 29, Small Business Majority partnered with the Inland Empire Regional Chamber of Commerce to co-host the Shop Inland Empire Pop-Up Market in San Bernardino, Calif. Pop-up markets are a unique and emerging venue for hopeful entrepreneurs to launch their small business dreams. As commercial rent costs continue to rise and workforce shortages pose challenges to small businesses, pop-up spaces and marketplaces offer a low-cost entry point for small business owners to test their products and market their business to community members.  The ..read more

Tuesday, August 8, 2023 Cristian Corona is the owner and founder of Little Sprouts Language Immersion Preschool, located in Los Angeles, Calif. After having her first child, she began working in the childcare industry and went back to school. This inspired her to open her first childcare center, which opened in 2020 just before the COVID-19 pandemic began. To get through the financial difficulties of the pandemic, Cristian began using her own personal savings to cover her business expenses. She needed urgent relief and was not informed about the different options available for emergency smal ..read more

Monday, July 31, 2023 Serving her local community came as a natural transition for JeJuan Stewart, CEO and Lead Consultant of EAGLE 7 Consulting in rural Georgia. She also leads the John and JeJuan Stewart, Jr. Foundation, a nonprofit organization whose vision is to create a group of focused, empowered youth who make a positive difference as individuals in their families and communities.  JeJuan started her consulting firm more than 11 years ago while working as a Physician's Assistant in Anesthesia (PA-C). Now with over 25 years of experience in community engagement, she is using her r ..read more