The contest is one of a flurry of recent efforts to boost local economies by backing small ventures and teaching people business skills. In September, Etsy expanded its training program for artisans, and in November, Goldman Sachs (GS) brought its 10,000 Small Business initiative to Detroit, following an earlier push by others there. Such efforts don’t always succeed: Witness the recent closing of a pet food retailer that received a grant to open in downtown Macon, Ga.
St. Louis native Jim McKelvey, who heads Arch Grants’s advisory board and is a co-founder of mobile payments company Square, says the $50,000 grants set the nonprofit apart from other initiatives that support startups. (Square has been hosting a separate series of events to boost small businesses in different cities, including St. Louis.) “Companies have a real hard time at the beginning,” says McKelvey, and the loot can mean the difference between success and failure. “I’ve seen a lot of companies in Arch Grants that probably wouldn’t exist but for this program,” he says.
“It gets the money into the company’s hands at a very, very early stage,” McKelvey says, in a city where entrepreneurs gain more for their money in rent and employee salaries, compared to higher-cost cities such as San Francisco or New York.
Article Appeared @http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-12-11/wanted-more-startups-in-st-dot-louis-dot-reward-50-000#r=hpt-fs