Tag Archives: business assistance

Delegation Equals Liberation for Small Business Owners

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Product shipment preparation is one task that could be delegated. Article by Sandy Nelson.

Sooner or later, an entrepreneur has to know his limits and acknowledge that some tasks can and should be done by others to allow him to focus on the bigger picture. That requires delegation — trusting others, whether subordinates, partners or independent contractors, to complete an assignment as directed.

As obvious as that sounds, an entrepreneur can have a hard time trusting others with his “baby,” ultimately defeating many business objectives and stunting the company’s natural growth.

Many businesses in New Mexico start small, with the owner doing all the work that’s required to get off the ground. Success only increases the workload, and the owner who doesn’t delegate eventually will find her attention pulled away from mission-critical decisions into fussing with day-to-day minutia — answering phones or emails from clients or vendors, filing, blogging — or running in place trying to accomplish tasks outside her expertise. Continue reading →

NMSBA Program Brings Small Businesses, National Laboratories Together

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Visit Honeymoon Brewery Dec. 8 for their grand opening in Santa Fe. Article by Jason Gibbs.

The crew from Santa Fe’s Honeymoon Brewery is raising a glass to the New Mexico Small Business Assistance Program and offering a hearty “salud” to David Fox of Los Alamos National Laboratories.

The cause for celebration? The successful pairing of a small-scale kombucha brewing business and a scientist at one of the nation’s premier research laboratories that was made possible through the NMSBA, a free program that gives small business owners in New Mexico access to the resources available at both LANL and Sandia National Laboratory.

For Honeymoon founders Ayla Bystrom-Williams and James Hill, working with LANL’s Fox allowed them to refine their brewing process and scientifically cut through a trial-and-error development process to better understand how to achieve the particular flavors they sought. Continue reading →

Startup Resources Intrinsic to Business Success

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With help from Accion, ‘magic,’ passion, comfort with risk are other key ingredients.

Daven Lee, Owner of Love+Leche; Article by Sandy Nelson

Borrowing money to start or build a business entails taking risk — not just for the lender but also the borrower. But unless the entrepreneur has rich relatives or massive savings to draw on, securing capital usually requires multiple loans over many years to start and expand a business.

Daven Lee has tapped into New Mexico’s many small-business resources over nearly two decades to turn Love + Leche from a home-based maker of handmade soaps and lotion bars — made with milk from her own goat herd and other natural products — for retail sale into a viable year-round business that gets about half its revenue from wholesale markets throughout the U.S. and in Mexico, England and Australia. Continue reading →

WESST’s online courses help women entrepreneurs build dreams

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WESST’s DreamBuilder online business course; Article by Sandy Nelson

Not everyone has the resources to go to college for an MBA, but anyone with an internet connection and some self-discipline can learn business basics through the DreamBuilder program offered by the nonprofit small-business development and training organization WESST.

DreamBuilder targets women who want to start their own businesses or need additional support to increase profitability. It’s one of a growing number of massive open online courses (MOOCs) that offer busy people a way to explore subjects that interest them — and often to earn credit for their efforts. Continue reading →

Historic Farm Pursues Innovation with Help from NM MEP

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Los Poblanos’ Lavender Hand Salve; Article by Jason Gibbs

With a history of agricultural experimentation dating back to the 1930s and a storied tradition reaching into the depths of New Mexico’s territorial history, Los Poblanos has bridged the centuries and now, with the assistance of New Mexico Manufacturing Extension Partnership (NM MEP), continues to preserve the past and pursue innovation.

The land surrounding Los Poblanos was, sometime around 1716, made a part of the Elena Gallegos Land Grant which surrounded and shaped what is now Albuquerque and was first mentioned in the 1790 Census as one of six settlements in Albuquerque’s North Valley. Continue reading →

New Mexico Film Conference Sheds Light on Entrepreneurial Opportunities

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By Belle Allen

The film industry in New Mexico offers numerous opportunities for entrepreneurs to get in on the “lights, camera, action!”

To share information about state resources and growing industry trends with filmmakers, producers, accountants, studios, vendors, crew, actors and emerging media innovators, the New Mexico State Film Office hosts the New Mexico Film and Media Industry Conference.

Established players in the state’s vibrant film industry aren’t the only ones who could benefit from the workshops and sessions: The event is a setting for savvy creatives and go-getters to find a niche in established service areas and to learn about unmet needs their products, properties and talents might fill. Continue reading →

Industrial Revenue Bonds Offer Novel Approach to Economic Development

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By Harold W. Lavender, Jr., Of Counsel, Montgomery & Andrews, P.A.

By Harold W. Lavender, Jr.

Industrial revenue bonds are a form of public-private partnership — a tool that governments can use to stimulate economic development, allowing them to offer tax subsidies for new or expanding businesses that create jobs and improve communities. Subsidies may include a property tax exemption; a gross receipts tax deduction and compensating tax exemption if certain equipment is purchased with bond proceeds; an exemption for bond interest from New Mexico income tax; and in some cases, an exemption of bond interest from federal income tax.

These types of bond issues have been popular as a way to help New Mexico cities and towns compete — without assuming financial liability — for capital-intensive projects by extending tax subsidies to reduce the risks and costs for a company to move here. New Mexico cities and counties are authorized to issue IRBs. Continue reading →

Los Alamos National Lab Program Shares Cutting Edge Technologies

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Marianne Johnston

By Mariann Johnston, Richard P. Feynman Center for Innovation

Los Alamos National Laboratory has a stockpile of patents covering technologies with untapped commercial potential, and it wants to simplify the process of sharing these innovations — as well as its portfolio of copyright-protected software — with businesses that can translate this wealth into private-sector jobs.

The lab’s Richard P. Feynman Center for Innovation (FCI) in August launched the Express Licensing program to fast-track the licensing of technologies and software with a simple online application. The application template standardizes licensing terms and makes it possible for LANL to share inventions on a broader scale without making potential partners and customers undergo exhaustive individualized negotiations. Continue reading →

MEP to Showcase Products Made in New Mexico

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Claudia Serrano

The New Mexico Manufacturing Extension Partnership is taking the “buy local” concept to a broader level with its New Mexico Made program.

The initiative aims to promote the companies that create and fabricate goods in New Mexico, where manufacturing is a $5.9 billion industry representing 7.4 percent of the total gross state product, according to the National Association of Manufacturers.

It does so by certifying qualifying businesses on the New Mexico Made website directory, raising the profile of the state’s manufacturers and giving participating businesses access to promotions and networking opportunities.

Continue reading →

Revitalizing New Mexico’s Historic Centers of Commerce

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Economic development in New Mexico is often a joint effort of individual communities and the state’s Economic Development Department (EDD), which oversees multiple programs designed to bolster the state’s infrastructure and support the entrepreneurial ambitions of New Mexicans.

Three high profile initiatives are the New Mexico MainStreet Program and two programs that fall under its umbrella: the Frontier Communities Initiative and the Arts and Cultural Districts Program.

Continue reading →