Restaurants Revitalization Fund aims to help businesses impacted by pandemic
Business owners impacted by pandemic can apply for assistance online
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With the announcement of the recently launched Restaurant Revitalization Fund, the DEGC wants to alert all business owners who have been impacted about the money that is available.
DETROIT – As the restaurant industry tries to bounce back from the pandemic, the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation (DEGC) is trying to make the transition as smooth as possible for many businesses.
With the announcement of the recently launched Restaurant Revitalization Fund, the DEGC wants to alert all business owners who have been impacted about the money that is available.
Restaurant Revitalization Fund: How to get help as a small Detroit business
There is help out there for small businesses impacted by the pandemic, but many are still struggling.
DETROIT (FOX 2) - Small businesses across the country were hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tenecia Johnson, with Detroit Economic Growth Corporation, is determined to make sure Detroit businesses know there is help available. This is a fund that is out here to support them through the pandemic, Johnson said.
Johnson and others are going door-to-door to let business owners know.
We re making sure that we go into the food-based businesses inside of some of the liquor stores or that may be inside of barbershops. Those businesses as eligible as well, she said. This isn t just for businesses that are in brick-and-mortar stores fronts. If you re a home-based business and you re a caterer, you are eligible for this fund.
On a recent evening in Detroit’s Mexicantown neighborhood, notes from a guitar played by a busker on the sidewalk reverberated off the walls of the mural-covered buildings. The smells of Mexican street food filled the air, and Valeria Lopez was bent over a clipboard at a booth inside Taqueria Lupita’s Authentic Mexican Restaurant. Regulars just call it Lupita’s.
Valeria Lopez took over her parents business during the pandemic. She said she did not qualify for a PPP loan.
Credit Tyler Scott
Lopez runs the place now. She took over the business from her parents, who decided to retire when the pandemic hit. Her plan was to get a forgivable loan for small businesses from the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) to help pay her staff.
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The 27-year-old Detroiter learned how to do these things herself after spending 12 years in banking.
Her new business, called, not surprisingly, Building Bosses Boutique, is an online store that sells affordable casual and business attire.
The clothing business is a part of her Building Bosses Camp, which is a free mentoring program in which Nesbitt will teach aspiring and current entrepreneurs and professionals how to start and run a business, as well as how to go about finding financial resources and more. During my years of meeting with different business owners and going to different networking events, you come across so many people that either are being overcharged for something that they could do themselves but they didn t know, Nesbitt said.