Text by Michael Dumas

Across the United States, significant numbers of small businesses shuttered during the coronavirus pandemic. And yet, some measurements show that Mobile was one of two cities leading the nation in business applications through 2020, a marker indicating the long-term confidence of area entrepreneurs. In response, a concerted effort by the Mobile Chamber, Innovation Portal and the University of South Alabama has stepped up to support that growth with resources to thrive.

The spike in business applications wasn’t an outlier, either. Nationwide, they continue to increase over previous years with the Southeast leading the way. According to Business Insider, Alabama, Mississippi and South Carolina submitted at least 30% more applications compared to 2019. To meet the additional demand, especially among minority-owned businesses, which are experiencing exponential growth, available resources have increased locally as well.

Last fall, the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) awarded a $2.8 million grant to the Mobile Area Chamber of Commerce Foundation (Chamber Foundation) as part of a newly established Capital Readiness Program. This grant funds a three-pronged partnership between the Chamber Foundation, Innovation Portal and the University of South Alabama’s Melton Center for Entrepreneurship to establish the Mobile Capital Access Network or MobileCAN!

In its first year, the network has helped entrepreneurs and small business owners gain access to capital, networks and capacity building. Currently, there are 12 programs under the MobileCAN! umbrella, designed to address those components.

MobileCAN! provides programming to connect small businesses and entrepreneurs with other business owners, capital funders and mentors. These programs are further supported by networking events which allow many of the programs facilitated under MobileCAN! to maximize their impacts.

“This grant has allowed the MobileCAN! partners to build a foundational network and support system that links ecosystem assets, programs and opportunities together and makes them more accessible,” said Don Mosley, executive director of the Melton Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. “Once a participant completes one program, they are referred to other programs and supported until they meet their goals. Like a relay in track and field, we are passing the baton to the next partner to continue business growth and success.”

Eddie Powell is an electrical engineer and consultant by trade but has been an active entrepreneur for most of his adult life. One of his first ventures was a regional trucking company he started with family members. That experience gave him a taste of interstate commerce prior to the company going out of business. Where most businesspeople would be discouraged and dissuaded from trying anything else, Powell pushed forward and developed new ideas, for which he sought advice and opportunities through all three MobileCAN! program partners.

Powell participated in Innovation Portal’s Money Fest, a one-

day annual symposium focused on capital with breakout sessions about different types of funding, insights from founders, and access to funding experts. One such expert is Innovation Portal Executive Director Todd Greer.

Greer told Powell about some of the additional resources available to small and minority-owned businesses, including Money Fest and the Minority Business Accelerator (MBA) program at USA. When Powell met Melton Center Executive Director Don Mosley, he showed him the pitch deck for his new business — Gulf Solar — and was shocked at the reaction.

“I showed it to him, and he just lit up,” Powell said. “I don’t know if I just needed some inspiration, but the way a complete stranger was so excited, and he told me, you need to do this.”

Shortly thereafter, Powell applied for the MBA, a nine-week program for small, established business owners to develop customers, products and services, as well as a growth plan. At that point, he said Gulf Solar became more than something he wished would happen; instead, it was a business with momentum and worth the risk.

According to Powell, Gulf Solar is a company dedicated to bringing fully electric-powered semi-trucks to the Gulf Coast. Leaning on his engineering expertise and his prior trucking experience, he has pioneered advanced technology and logistics in the hopes of growing Gulf Solar into an industry leading “trucking solution” firm with a fleet of 300 electric trucks within just a few years. Equally important to the conveyances themselves are the megawatt charging stations necessary for the fleet to operate throughout the region. Gulf Solar would build those facilities, as well.

“When I attended my first business navigator session, I wasn’t very open-minded,” Powell said. “But I walked away with my mind blown by all the different resources that are available, including the people who actually want to help you succeed.

“I wish I knew about all of this when I started my first company.”

The relationship between networking and capital can’t be denied by Powell, who said within a week of enrolling in the MBA, he was connected with possible financiers. Two months afterwards, both entities were in contract negotiations to move Gulf Solar forward.

“I started off pitching a pilot program to them, but they stopped me midway through and said, ‘We’re sold,’” he said. “So, I left that meeting thinking: this is real, this is happening.”

For Ameshia Bush-Taylor, one of the most significant contributions of MobileCAN! has been accountability. For seven years, the family nurse practitioner has owned and operated Imperial Home Care Services, a company she founded after years of caring for her mother and uncle as they fought cancer. She experienced firsthand the gaps between home healthcare and a patient’s quality of life.

This summer, she enrolled in the Mobile Chamber’s Blueprint for Capital, a nine-week program meant to create a three-year growth plan with preparations for capital acquisition.

“Ameshia’s company is at the ideal stage to benefit from Blueprint for Capital, a program that helps business owners assess key aspects of their business, especially financials. By participating, they can strengthen their financial strategy and improve their chances of securing capital for growth.” said Danette Richards, senior director of small business for the Mobile Chamber.

Having previously gone through the Mobile Chamber’s Business Navigation Service, Bush-Taylor said that Blueprint Instructor Rick Miller was instrumental in “holding my feet to the fire,” and making sure “if I say I’m going to do something, making me accountable in doing it.”

“(Blueprint for Capital) has actually opened my eyes up a lot,” Bush-Taylor said. “I feel like I’ve done well in the years I’ve been in business, but I still have a lot to learn and a lot of room to grow.”

That growth includes two secondary businesses she created in 2024: Imperial Weight Loss and Spa and Imperial Drip Factor — an IV hydration company.

To achieve its goals, MobileCAN! programs must serve the development stage of new business ventures, not just bolster those business owners with previous, or current, experience in entrepreneurship. This incubation and acceleration is a specialty at Innovation Portal, which since 2016 has been serving budding entrepreneurs. One such entrepreneur is Stephany Garcia who moved to Mobile a year ago as a design engineer for Airbus.

Garcia’s hometown of Pereira, Columbia, has been associated with the coffee industry for generations, as it is located within the Coffee Triangle, a source of some of the world’s best Arabica beans. Her father had a coffee roasting business when she was growing up, and that rich, agrarian heritage continues to boil in her blood. But as a young woman who came to America when she was 16, Garcia has progressive ideas when it comes to delivering quality caffeine to the Western masses.

So, in 2022 she created Kafedi, which is a hybridized word combining the Dutch-German word for coffee, “kafe,” and the Spanish word “di,” which means “to gift.” Garcia spent two years in Belgium, where the brand was born.

“I like the action of giving, so I’m giving coffee,” she said. Although in its infancy, the e-commerce company focuses on bringing the best of the Columbian coffee experience to customers wanting a single-serving product without the need for expensive machines or advanced barista skills. Kafedi coffee comes in either whole beans or packaged in “ear hang” pouches made of coffee cloth, which attach to the side of a mug and allow the coffee to steep.

Already well versed in branding, international commerce and other necessary skills, what Garcia needed was a community and capital. Shortly after landing in Mobile, she found the Innovation Portal, and its Portal Fund: RISE program, which helps new and mid-stage business owners with access to programming, mentorship and other resources. Garcia said RISE helped her realize she didn’t need a major investment to start testing her product on potential customers, allowing her to develop the strategy of creating interest in her product to drive funding, instead of the opposite, more traditional approach. Using $5,000 that she received from the program, she established Kafedi as an LLC, opened a business banking account and invested in marketing and web tools, such as equipment she can use to create social media videos and other content. She then participated in the one-day Money Fest program, where entrepreneurs seek funding from investors.

“Pitching a business to stakeholders who can heavily impact the growth of your business was inspiring and enlightening,” Garcia said. “People act differently to your idea once there is money on the line.”

Although she has been selling her products to coworkers and colleagues, Garcia said Kafedi will officially go live and be available to the world in November, allowing her to break the “survival cycle” which has limited her family for years. That goal started when she became the first member of her family to travel to the United States, and while still in high school.

“I feel like we’ve always had the mindset of just doing small things,” she said. “But I’m inspired to bring something different to the table.

“At the beginning I had to talk to a lot of people and get myself out there, and I think that is the key to get support, share your vision and test your product in the community you live in.”

Information on MobileCAN! and its variety of programs can be found at mobilecan.org or by emailing [email protected].

Originally appeared in the November 2024 issue of Mobile Bay Magazine.