Restoration and Urbane

Through a small business referral network or "Food Guild", Restoration and Urbane are bringing small businesses assistance bolstering communication over competition to grow/scale BIPOC businesses and establishing more streamlined coordination of services to support BIPOC- owned enterprises in Central Brooklyn.

AT A GLANCE

GRANTEE PARTNERS

1. Restoration (Lead)

2. Urbane

LOCATIONS

Central and Eastern Brooklyn

TARGET BENEFICIARIES

Women of Color, African American/Black small business owners

Veterans

Formerly incarcerated individuals

LGBTQIA+

Immigrant populations

KEY STATS

100% of business owners served by Urbane and Restoration reside in LMI regions

ACTIVITIES & ACHIEVEMENTS

After 6 months, the partnership proudly claims these markers of success from the Planning Grant:

  • Small Business Food Guild Workshop series included well attended small business sessions

  • Expanded the support network through cohort-based referrals from Urbane's Community Business Academy to the Brooklyn Business Center at Restoration

  • Restoration and Urbane are now connected via an online platform enabling inter-organizational client management and engagement

  • Additional linkage created with Brooklyn Communities Collaborative as part of broader movement to close the institutional procurement opportunity gap

STORYTELLING

Two anecdotes reveal the nature of this planning project and its transformative potential: 1) Tokunbo Anifalaje was selected to represent Restoration on the Brooklyn Communities Collaborative Health Enterprise Advisory Council. Tokunbo not only leveraged this opportunity to engage other Council members on the Food Guild, she also extended participation to Urbane, ensuring the Food Guild would factor into intersectional conversations related to the wealth gap, Black economic health, & social determinants of health. 2) Urbane is actively sharing/seeding conceptual information about the Food Guild with its incubator members, Community Business Academy participants, market vendors and Flatbush corridor. The Urbane team engaged with the local Caribbean food icons on the corridor surrounding Flatbush Central. These small, Black-owned businesses were delighted when team members opened lines of inquiry related to their pain points, growth aspirations and opportunities to tap into economies of scale through cooperative action. The conversation confirmed the project hypothesis that micro businesses are ready for a new approach to growth.

Contact Us

For more information on how to join the Collective and help transform the New York small business landscape, fill out the contact form below:


NY Small Business Funders Collective

Project Management provided by:
ImpactFull, Inc.
Kristine Michie, Managing Partner
kristine@impactfullinc.com (funder inquiries) inquiries@nysmallbusinessfunders.org (grant application inquiries)
www.impactfullinc.com

Fiscal Sponsorship provided by:

Philanthropy New York. www.philanthropynewyork.org