The Visa Foundation Launches Initiatives To Support Minority-Owned SMBs

The Visa Foundation has launched several new initiatives aimed at providing nearly $5 million in capital to minority-owned small and micro-businesses (SMB) to help them weather the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

The new push also includes a mentorship program for minority-led SMBs and the release of a new report, Supporting Social Equity by Boosting Small Businesses, that discusses how Black and African American-owned businesses have suffered a sharper drop in ownership than those owned by other ethnic groups.

The white paper, released by the Visa Economic Empowerment Institute, examines the historical trends and systemic barriers that Black-owned businesses face on top of the current pandemic crisis. The paper also recommends policy measures to help boost Black-owned businesses and ownership, such as investing in equity in education and providing more training and scholarship programs.

As part of the initiative, the Visa Foundation is committing $3 million to Black Ambition, a new racial equity and entrepreneurship program launched by Pharrell Williams in collaboration with five Historically Black Colleges and Universities. The foundation is also committing $1.5 million to the Local Initiatives Support Corporation, a group dedicated to increasing the resiliency of businesses owned by women of color who are being impacted by the pandemic.

Other commitments under the Visa initiative include $300,000 to VC Include, a group dedicated to helping women of color hone their fundraising skills through education and training programs.

Visa also recently launched a mentorship program with Bridge for Billions, where Visa employees will mentor Black, primarily women-owned SMBs through a three-month incubation program. The mentors will help business owners refine their business models, draft business plans and determine financial projections. The deadline for applications for the February 2021 term is Dec. 31, 2020.

The Visa Foundation said its latest initiatives are an extension of its previously announced $200 million commitment to boost SMBs, particularly those owned by women.

In September, Visa co-hosted a three-day virtual summit in celebration of National Small Business Week called the What’s Next Fest in partnership with the Female Founder Collective (FFC). Attendees received “expert guidance” on navigating one of the most challenging years in retail history. As part of that virtual event, Visa and IFundWomen also announced the extension of a grant program to India and awarded 25 grants and annual coaching memberships to Black female-owned SMBs, doubling the size of that program.

Meanwhile, organizations like The Opportunity Fund have been deluged by requests for assistance from minority- and women-owned businesses trying to ride out the pandemic storm.

The nonprofit Opportunity Fund — which makes loans to small businesses owned by low- and moderate-income immigrants, women and other underserved clientele — started 2020 fairly optimistically. The organization expected to make close to $10 million in loans every month, serving 3,000 to 4,000 SMBs. But then March came around with its early hints of the COVID-19 outbreak, and in April “everything just broke loose,” CEO Luz Urrutia told Karen Webster in June.

She said the group suddenly found itself facing an onslaught of queries from small businesses looking for loans, trying to get payment deferments or inquiring about technical assistance to shift to digital. “Before April, we would get 300 or 400 phone calls a day,” Urrutia said. “That shot up to 1,500 or 1,600 calls a day.”