Sixteen area business owners now have the "knowledge, connections, and the know-how" to grow their business with support from the NextLevel Chattanooga, an entrepreneurship program offered by the Urban League of Greater Chattanooga in collaboration with the city of Chattanooga Office of Multicultural Affairs, Chattanooga Small Business Development Center and BrightBridge.
NextLevel Chattanooga is a seven-month program based upon the nationally recognized and award-winning StreetWise MBA curriculum. This curriculum was developed by Interise, a Boston-based nonprofit committed to helping existing small businesses that are interested in growing their businesses to scale. The curriculum includes topics including financial management, marketing and sales, human resources tactics, business strategy development and access to new capital and contracts.
More than 3,500 businesses across the country have completed the curriculum over the past 11 years and as a result these businesses have been able to create jobs as eight times the rate of private sectors. The first cohort of Chattanooga businesses will be recognized on Thursday and presented with certificates documenting the completion of NextLevel Chattanooga during a reception held in their honor.
Applications are now being accepted for the next NextLevel Chattanooga session that begins in late February.
The reception will be held Thursday from 6-7 p.m. at the Bessie Smith Hall, 200 E. Marin Luther King Blvd.
Graduates of the inaugural NextStep Chattanooga cohort are: Dr. Thomas Rumph, Aspire Family Dentistry; Cherita Adams, Blue Orleans Seafood Restaurant; Melinda Bone, Chicken-w-Bones; Charles Bass, CIB Enterprises; James Rogers, Customer Healthcare, LLC; Sarah Hooper, Dish T’ Cooking School & Catering Co.; Amanda Varnell, Dish T’ Cooking School & Catering Co.; Sam Bicking, Docu-Shed; Cheryl Key, John P. Franklin Funeral Home; John “Duke” Franklin, Jr., John P. Franklin Funeral Home; Grace Frank, Grace Frank Group; Norma Maloney, LoAdebar; John “JJ” Jerman, Office Furniture Warehouse; Jason Hill, Papercut Interactive, Inc.; Richard Carmack, RMJ Tactical; Efren Ormaza, Terra Nostra and Wendy Buckner, The Hot Chocolatier.