Sacramento Picks First Class Of Companies To Get Free Consulting, Cash
Source: Sacramento Business Journal, Mark Anderson
Photo: Tina Reynolds is the founder of Uptown Studios, one of the companies selected for the Economic Gardening program. (COURTESY TINA REYNOLDS)
The city of Sacramento has chosen the seven companies it will help grow with professional consulting services and up to $50,000 in cash each.
Rather than using money to recruit growing companies to move to Sacramento, the Economic Gardening economic development program subsidizes consulting research for local companies willing to invest in their own growth.
That consulting cost, which is about $4,290 for each company, is picked up by the city.
Sacramento is piloting an Economic Gardening 2.0 version, in which the city also includes a stipend of up to $50,000, said Louis Stewart, city chief innovation officer, in an interview.
The money is meant to help the companies implement the suggestions of the consultants, who are from the National Center for Economic Gardening, based in Evergreen, Colorado.
The companies selected include healthy meal delivery company Trifecta Inc., handcrafted food maker Preservation & co., creative agency Uptown Studios, general contractor AHI Construction, design firm The Honey Agency Inc., event planning company The Party Concierge and vaping developer Hamilton Devices. The city sought applicants for the program in November.
“It’s pretty cool. This is a windfall,” said Tina Reynolds, founder of Uptown Studios. “Businesses like mine don’t get this kind of help.”
She’s been running Uptown Studios since 1992, and she says she does a pretty good job, “but you don’t know what you don’t know. I think this will give me insights into blindspots I might have. There is always something you don’t see because you just don’t see it.”
Reynolds is also interested in working with the cohort of companies to compare notes on the best ways of running a business.
“We must focus our attention on nurturing the entrepreneurs who have already planted their businesses in Sacramento and help them to expand and thrive,” said Mayor Darrell Steinberg, in a news release. “Our Economic Gardening 2.0 program is a key component of that strategy. The young companies we are working with today could be our major employers in the future.”
Under the Economic Gardening program, the city picked seven entrepreneurial companies to get 36 hours of consulting service for no charge.
The Economic Gardening consultants include researchers who scour corporate databases, geographic database systems, search engine optimization trends and marketing tools to provide company owners with information and conclusions about their business, market and marketing.
The Economic Gardening program is being done in partnership with the Sacramento Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and the California State University Sacramento Career Center, which are helping match the cash grants.
The program requires the companies to be locally based, have between five and 99 employees and have annual revenue between $1 million to $50 million.
In addition to the consulting and the matching funds, the businesses also can work with the CSUS Career Center on talent development, which could include partnering with a student fellow.