May 6, 2022
On May 25, 2022, the Wyoming County Chamber & Tourism office, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Wyoming County, and the Wyoming County IDA are sponsoring an educational seminar that will help food and farm businesses learn more about crowdfunding. The seminar will show how this ‘grassroots investing tool’ can help jumpstart food entrepreneurs and farm businesses looking to expand their farm or food related business.
The event will run from 7:00PM - 8:30PM, at the Wyoming County Ag & Business Center, Learning Center 1, 36 Center Street, Warsaw, NY. There is no cost to participate. Reservations are required by visiting programs and events.
Last year, the level of investment crowdfunding exceeded the previous four years combined. More than a million Americans have invested more than $1 billion in small businesses. The average crowdfunding business has raised nearly $300,000. And the most successful businesses have been those run by women or BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) CEOs. Even if someone is not a farm or food related business, they are invited to learn how crowdfunding works.
The team with Food Future WNY will be on-hand to help answer questions about starting a campaign, and presenter Michael Shuman from SCALE (Sequestering Carbon. Accelerating Local Economies) will speak on crowdfunding basics, lead a discussion, and teach how to take advantage of this grassroots tool of finance.
Among the topics that will be discussed:
- How can a business prepare itself to be successful at investment crowdfunding?
- What crowdfunding portals are best?
- What’s the right amount to crowdfund?
- How can a business get started?
Food Future WNY, (www.foodfuturewny.org) is a consortium of foundations and organizations in Western New York (WNY), and nearly one hundred leaders who have been meeting regularly to reshape the region’s food system. Michael Shuman has been leading their efforts to develop new sources of finance for food and farming businesses (FFBs) and will share some of the emerging new tools for grassroots finance.
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