Black Wall Street Muskegon, an organization that supports Black- and Brown-owned businesses in West Michigan, is hosting a business pitch event at Muskegon Community College’s Stevenson Center for Higher Education.
On November 18, Muskegon Community College will play host to the Black Wall Street Muskegon Business Pitch Event. The event is a competition which will inspire innovative business ideas and features over 30 submissions this year.
Black Wall Street Muskegon is an organization that aims to offer a support network for Black- and Brown-owned businesses in West Michigan. The event will take place at Muskegon Community College’s Stevenson Center for Higher Education from 5:35 p.m. until 8:30 p.m.
President and Founder of Black Wall Street Muskegon, Lashae Simmons II, spoke to MLive about the competition, saying, “We did it last year, and yes, we were able to provide the money aspect of it, but the educational aspect wasn’t quite there, and I believe that we missed the mark, so we had to come back in as an organization and fine-tune some things so that disparity in education and entrepreneurial rates in general for people of color, we began to minimize.”
The event is different this year from years previous; it has been separated into a six-week Black Business Accelerator program, which ran from October 4 through November 7, and the participants’ Business Pitch presentations, which will be held at the November 18 event at Muskegon Community College in front of five judges.
Simmons II mentioned to MLive that she had seen a need among Black entrepreneurs to create a foundation of understanding about how to create a pitch deck and Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats analysis, or SWOT.
That is why Simmons II partnered with the Fab Lab and Muskegon Community College to provide classroom space for the participants to take advantage of resources, such as Henrietta Hadley with Infinite Solutions Consulting Group. Once a week, Hadley teaches a class on the finer points of pitching ideas and identifying market needs.
Simmons II continued on to talk about some of the obstacles standing in the way of Black entrepreneurs, and how she wants to help: “As the founder of Black Wall Street, I’ve noticed that there’s a lot of funding out here, but seems as if we’re consistently missing the mark for funding. And what I want to do is be a go-between, and provide opportunities for these Black and Brown-owned businesses to create a program and help fund these dreams.”
The seven finalists who attend the November 18 event will get to network with other area business owners and vendors when the doors open at 5:35 p.m. until the event properly begins at 6:45 p.m. when the first pitch will be presented.
Third place will win $250, second $500, and first place will win $5,000.
Simmons II also emphasized the importance of aspiring entrepreneurs to believe in their projects and advocate for themselves. Even if someone may shy away from competitions or being in the spotlight, she encouraged them to participate in business pitch events in the future, saying, “You have to be willing to have a conversation with any and everyone that will listen. And you have to know how to get to the point. And it’s scary. But when you believe in yourself, and when you believe in your product or service, you have to get up there and do it. You cannot allow fear to dictate potential prosperity.”
More information about the Black Wall Street Muskegon organization can be found here.
More information about Muskegon Community College can be found on its website.