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Stop Panicking and Start Acting:

5 steps to Take Today to Save Your Small Businesses and Begin to Rebuild Your Local Economy


Our small businesses are closed because of the need to contain COVID-19 and protect human health.

These businesses, the backbone of our economy from big city to small town, will not survive the pause (the black hole?) in our economy without direct and immediate assistance from our governments, banking community, non-profits, and all other local economic leaders.

Our pre-COVID economic development and small business development strategies need to adapt.

We need to rethink our next steps and get really strategic about how to save small businesses so they can survive and then rebuild. And we need to do it….fast. Recast City is here to help.

We’ll work with you to take a fresh look at your immediate needs, look at who and what is missing from your small business outreach and support, and review your existing outreach networks with our Survive & Rebuild Strategy. Then we’ll help you build a new plan – based on your staff capacity and network – to better achieve the needs of your small business community.

If you’re interested in learning more, schedule a chat and let’s see if it’s a fit. We’re kicking off new Survive & Rebuild Strategy projects daily during this time of rapid change and overwhelming need.

 

How it Works

By the end of your 5-week Survive & Rebuild Strategy, you’ll have a concrete plan to move forward, connect with and understanding of small businesses not stepping forward, own an expanded list of local small businesses, and set critical new programs in place to fill the gaps so your small businesses can survive and then rebuild.

1. Make Outreach & Information Go Farther

First, we’ll work through your existing outreach and crisis information flow to small businesses, determining together how we can streamline and focus this work, and reach more small business owners. We’ll make concrete recommendations on how to connect to small business owners not yet coming forward for assistance, build a database of diverse micro-business owners who may not be connected to local services, and create a network of connectors to the different communities in your locality.

Deliverable: Expanded list of small businesses to connect to resources and a new crew of helpers to disseminate information more effectively.

2. Understand the Gaps in Assistance

Second, we’ll interview a set of small business owners, that represent the demographic and business diversity of your community, to understand what emergency programs they’re accessing and what gaps still need to be filled to allow these businesses to survive this crisis.

Deliverable: Summary of needs from local small business owners and clear analysis of the remaining gaps in support.

3. Develop New Initiatives to Fill the Gaps

Third, we’ll work with you (and pull from examples popping up all over the country) to develop discreet, manageable new initiatives to fill these gaps so that more of your local small businesses have the support they need to survive. We will build on existing programs where ever possible to expedite delivery of the assistance.

Deliverable: New initiative (or adaptation of existing ones) recommendations and draft language of the top action to roll out immediately.

4. Build a new 6-Month Strategy

Lastly, we’ll work with you and your team to have a concrete plan moving forward, with clear outcomes, measures of success, and priorities, adapting from your pre-COVID economic development plan to a nimble, inclusive, 6-month strategy that responds to your small business needs of today and helps you rebuild to a strong economy in the future.

Deliverable: 6-month strategy with clear measures of success to help your small businesses survive and then thrive.

5-week project*: $6,000

* Additional services can be added as needed.

We also have an alternative project focused on bringing together small-scale manufacturers to create PPE and other essential needs during this crisis.

The Survive & rebuild Strategy is typically a 5-week engagement.

If you’re interested in learning more, get in touch by emailing ilana@recastcity.com or scheduling a call here. We’re kicking off new Survive & Rebuild Strategy projects daily during this time of rapid change and transition.

 

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