Open4BizBC.com: A Step-By-Step Plan for Potential Entrepreneurs

This time on the BC City Connection, John Hart of the Small Business Development Office talks about Open4BizBC.com, a self-serve website that helps entrepreneurs understand what it really takes to open a business in Battle Creek. 

The discussion breaks down how the seven-step guide reduces surprises around zoning, permits, licensing, and costs so more small businesses can launch and last.

Episode Resources
OpenforBizBC.com

Watch the video of this discussion here or see the episodes on Access Vision in Battle Creek Tuesdays at 6:30 PM on channel 17/917.

The BC City Connection Podcast is produced by Livemic Communications.

Transcript

Richard Piet 0:04

I'm Richard Piet. Welcome to the BC City Connection, the official podcast from the City of Battle Creek. Today, if you're a business owner or if you want to be in the city of Battle Creek, there's a tremendous resource that you should know about. And John Hart is here from the Small Business Development Office in Battle Creek to tell us about that. Hello, John. Hi, Richard. Thanks for having us. Well, thanks for being here. It's uh a website and the domain is openforbizbc.com, and we'll spell that out for you eventually because there's some tricks to that. But you get the point, right? This is meant to be a resource for people who want to be entrepreneurs. That's correct.

John Hart 0:48

Yeah, it's a for, like you said. It's open for number four, uh, bizbc. So, yeah, and you can get there.

Why A One-Stop Startup Guide

Richard Piet 0:57

And we'll actually put the link too in the show notes for this episode so you can click right through if you need to. What did you want this resource to be? And how did you go about finding out what would be useful in it?

John Hart 1:12

So ultimately, what we've been hearing from people over the last say uh decade, I think, since since I've been around, was that businesses really wanted to uh sort of have an open resource to figure out how to open their business. And that when they think about that, I think often they think about funding. But when they actually start to open a business, it's it's also about permitting and regulatory issues, right? And they don't really realize that till they get into it. And then when they get into it, they start to think, well, how come I don't know about all these things? Um, how am I supposed to get all this information? Can I get it in one place, right? And so, uh, and then there was a time uh in in the Battle Creek community where we didn't have an entrepreneurial support system like we do now. Um and so as we were working through the discovery part of that, people said, you know, we'd really like to have a one-stop shop to get this information about resources, grants, regulatory issues, permitting. And and we also don't want to have any uh gatekeepers. We we want to do this on our own if we can, if at all possible. So it this this website was really sort of birthed out of that that desire for people to get access to the information when they want it and have it be clear and have let them be able to choose their path.

Richard Piet 2:37

Well, that makes a lot of sense. And and you and I have talked before about the idea that sometimes a person with an idea for a business is is so engrossed in that that it is feasible that someone could get some distance down the the path of creating that business and realize they have a permitting issue or they have a zoning issue or there's some kind of step that they just weren't aware of. And this helps to try and uh head that off, doesn't it?

John Hart 3:11

It it does, yeah. So uh, you know, meeting one-on-one with uh any one of the stakeholders is still necessary to try to sort of find your way, right? Because a lot of people don't really know, they've got a good an idea of what they think would be a business, and maybe they're highly specialized uh in the area of that business. So if you're into food, you know how to cook food, or if you're into hair, you know how to do hair, or if you're into uh merchandising um t-shirts or something like that, you know, okay, you're into that. But what do you know about business acumen? Or what do you know about financing, or what do you know about uh regulatory or permitting issues? That's where it gets tricky because if you have a passion about something, you you might not know all the inner workings of actually how to put the business together.

Richard Piet 4:02

And you might not love knowing uh all those inner workings either.

John Hart 4:06

That's correct. It it it's sometimes the learning curve sometimes hurts. Yeah, and it's unfortunate. And like you alluded to, is that um again, you might have the passion, you might even have the understanding that you have to have a business license of some sort or incorporate yourself and have insurance, possibly. But then when you actually go to open up the business, it's likely if you've never been in business before, you maybe you've pulled a permit for your house to do something, but you likely have never done it on a commercial level. And there is a lot of regulations to where you can locate your business. Okay, that's the first checkbox. Can I do that here? And then after that, you know, you go through the uh the process with building inspections, and that's a whole different thing. They they could say, yes, this is permissible by zoning, and yes, this is permissible by building code, but can you afford to do it meeting all the uh the regulations?

Richard Piet 5:02

And by the way, the small business development office could even help you determine whether or not uh a certain idea for a business is feasible in Battle Creek. Is that true? Help you think it through.

John Hart 5:15

Yes, that is exactly what we do. We are a business liaison. Schedule a time with us, we sit down with you for an hour. Um, you sort of tell us all about your hopes and dreams for your business. And uh we don't tell you whether you can do it or not or whether you'll be successful or not, but we we sort of lay out the the roadmap for some of the things you might have to do that you weren't aware of just to get open. And then, of course, of course, 100%, we want you to be successful because if you're successful, our community is successful. So so the idea is to sort of um take the sting out of this a little bit, take the mystery out of it, and uh try to try to get businesses open as quickly as possible, right? On a step in the right direction rather than trying to open, not realizing you need certain permits, that you don't have enough capital to get it open and sustain yourself during a down period, and then just failing. And terribly, when people fail in small business, it it impacts their families and their community, right? Because they're they're generally funding it themselves. So it means that if they lose that that nest egg that they had that they were thinking about for retirement or for something special, and they decided to go into business, well, that's gone. And then now they have to try to recoup the rest of their lives to get that money back. So we're we're trying to um help alleviate that and uh help help us help small business uh be that engine that can help our local economy and remove blight and all kinds of uh other wonderful things that happen. Create jobs, add vibrancy to the community, all those things.

Richard Piet 6:53

Yeah, you start to see how all of that comes together with this and the notion that a resource like the Small Business Development Office, but as well uh this particular website can help support those uh those wheels turning. So someone goes to openforbizbc.com, and as we said, it's open for the number four, BIZBC.com. What do you expect that they will do? They get there and they're gonna follow a process of some kind, right?

Seven Steps And Industry Paths

John Hart 7:25

Yep, yep. It's a dynamic website, and uh, and we can talk about how we actually got to the idea of this particular website. But how the website works is that uh there's seven steps to opening your business. And so then there are five different business sectors to choose from. And the reason there's five different ones is because it's a dynamic website and some of the regulation changes as you move between different sectors. So for instance, general business doesn't really have a lot of requirements as it relates to uh licensing outside of the city. But if you do uh a food business, then uh the county is going to come in and there's a regulatory process there. Or if you're a tattooist or a hair salon, right? Those are regulated too. Once again, possibly from the state, possibly from the health department. Um, maybe there's some extra things uh with ventilation that you might have to do. So it changes some of the codes. And so the website will change with that. So you you can follow general business, pretty much get all the steps, but then if it's more of a specialized licensing, then uh maybe uh some of the steps in real in regards to permitting will change.

Richard Piet 8:42

So someone comes to the website with an idea for a business and they start to whittle down some of this pathway according to what they have in mind, and they're gonna start to get a sense for some of the things you describe about what might be expected of them.

Keeping It Current Without Gatekeepers

John Hart 8:59

Yep. Yep. The first couple steps are all pretty much the same, right? It's like, hey, what's your idea? How do you come upon this idea? You know, then then you move into, well, where am I gonna locate this thing, right? And if you've never heard of planning and zoning, which most people haven't, then it starts to uh describe what planning and zoning does. And then if you if you weren't really aware that you have to get permits and such for uh installing a hot water heater or that you might have to hire an architect, which you do on commercial properties, uh, you have to hire an architect or an engineer or a design professional, is what they call it. And the list website on that step talks about that. So it's a the seven steps are all very brief introductions. And then you can start to go to the resources attached to each one of those descriptions. And what we've done is uh rather than call out individuals, we call out departments. And so uh the goal would be is uh through ourselves and our stakeholders to help us sort of um come up with this idea and move it forward, is that we will all sort of take some ownership of this website and make sure that the links are working and make sure they're going uh directly to the resources that uh are important for people to find and follow. And then we can even follow up with those agencies that the links are going to and say, hey, you know, we've been checking this out, or um, or some of our small business uh folks that we're mentoring have been checking it out. And um, can you add a little detail here in this section? It might be very helpful to them to get to that information, and you won't have to field the calls. Um, you can actually send them right straight to the document.

Richard Piet 10:39

So that's pretty slick. Yeah. So as you figured out what would be on this website and the process of it, you probably had a bunch of feedback, right, from your office from folks who've been through this, and they were able to tell you, you know, it would be helpful to have this and that and this.

John Hart 10:59

Yes. So this website is um a combined effort of uh EOSs, so entrepreneurial support operators, right? Those folks that are out there uh doing this kind of work. So we've gone, uh, most of us, this this effort's around, you know, close to 10 years old of trying to offer small business assistance through organizations uh to people in the community. And so we've worked through this process, you know. And again, going back to gatekeeping, um if our leave tomorrow from my position or the office wasn't here, the the website could outlive, you know, the individual or the department, right? And other people can continue to access the information because all the information is it's hyperlocal to Battle Creek as it relates to the resources and the permitting process. But um, in general, you could put any city or county's name in these references and still follow the logic. The logic is the same. Again, from us learning what the community needs and what we're being asked of on a daily basis, um, that's what generated the seven steps and parts of the seven steps. But we also went out to practitioners um around the country, um, inside the region, and those people using uh sites like this, uh, economic development corporations, DDAs, chambers of commerce, and uh asked them about it and asked them to look at it. And so we've gotten feedback from the likes of Manistee has called us and reached out to us and told us that they're already using it for their individuals. But they just say, hey, if it says Battle Creek, uh just put in Manistee. It's the same rules. You know, if it says uh Calhoun County, just uh substitute our county. Um, so we've heard from the city of Kalamazoo from community development, they're also intrigued by it and said this is a missing step that we don't have over in Kalamazoo that um would be useful for our individuals. Um MEDC has just recently quoted about uh did a little piece on it. And so at my place, just uh introducing the concept, sharing the website, and saying this is a resource guide that's dynamic and very helpful. Um, the steps are not unique to us, really. Uh, building code is the same across the state of Michigan. That's people don't understand that. Uh it's it's it's one single code. Um, so the rules are pretty much the same. County uh health departments pretty much follow state regulation. So although it might uh you might be going to Calhoun County for permits, it's it's likely a form that was created from the state of Michigan. So it is sort of universal. Once you figure the the mapping out and the regulations out, and you know that they're pretty much the same no matter where you go, there's some unique things that are happened specifically to us as it relates to a resource, a grant, a loan, um, some expertise from a mentor like myself, or northern initiatives, or sprout um or Battle Creek Food Reimagined or Grand Valley State University, right? Those are those are more specific to Battle Creek and to our our community. But other than that, you can if you if you were from another community, you could just start slipping in the same resources that were uh you know pertain to your community, but the the regs are all the same pretty much across the state.

Mentoring, Marketing, And When To Pause

Richard Piet 14:20

Well, uh what a feather in our cap, right? To to have created this and now it's being used as an example for other uh municipalities and and uh areas where folks are looking for that same kind of guidance. So John and proud of it. Yeah. In these seven steps, at some point you're going to meet with that prospective business owner and help them uh carry forward. Where does that usually happen? Is it step eight or is it somewhere uh in the that process?

John Hart 14:55

Well, I guess that comes down to how did you find out about the website, right? So if someone finds out about the website because they saw it in the water bill, right? Because we that's how we've the kind of the steps of marketing is uh we put it in the water bill. It's up on the digital billboard up on Beckley. Um, commercial on a digital commercial on Wood TV. Um, we're handing out business cards throughout our uh stakeholder group. Um, so you might find it through another agency or a different place. And then when you go through the resource guide, you might find us, or you might find uh Darcy Schmidt through the planning department in the city of Battle Creek. And through that conversation, um, if it comes up and they mention how they got the information, well, I'm sure that Darcy would say, Well, you should really meet with John and the SBD team, right? Um, if it comes from a cohort conversation at NI, which we we give every cohort, we go down for an hour and chat with people about the very same things that are in this website. And that's that's important too. That's how we got here from having these conversations and saying, you know what? I can have this conversation 300 times in the year, and I can continue to have those conversations, but we could also put this down on paper, put it out on a website, and people can do it at their leisure. So again, how do they find us? Uh, how do they get to us? Well, they come to the website either because we directed them there or they got there on their own. But either way, they can come right back to us and we can mentor them through that, and we will also turn them right back over when they're ready, um, to Northern Initiatives and Sprout and Battle Creek Food Reimagined and GVSU and the Small Business Hub. So it's it's either all on the website or it's all through the the channels of the stakeholders.

Richard Piet 16:44

And in those other entities you mentioned, there's lots of other mentoring that goes on as well.

John Hart 16:50

Yeah. Yeah. And it's and again, they're on the website. They are one of the resources that you'll find through the website. So and you might eat, and the goal would be again is to get our stakeholders so engaged with this website that it's not just our, it's not our website. We launched it, but we we collaboratively launched it with knowing that uh the other stakeholders would also be referring people to it and referring them to us. Yeah.

Richard Piet 17:16

So uh you let's just be clear. Someone could be watching this who has this idea for a business, but you know, the uh they've they've not owned a business before. They're a little nervous about this idea. Uh let's be clear in saying you have met people like that with uh nothing more than an idea, and you've watched them navigate a process by which now they'd become entrepreneurs, and they've been successful, right?

John Hart 17:49

Yep, yes, yes. Um, so two points there. I've I've either helped and watched them navigate this process, or before they've started it, but they've inquired about it, we've we've sort of talked them off the ledge and said maybe it's not time now. Maybe, maybe you need to pause for a second, maybe you need to pivot, maybe you need to save a little more money. Maybe you didn't realize this isn't a $15,000 venture, this is a $150,000 venture. And and you know, risk versus reward. Is this the right thing to do for you? So a lot of it is mentoring, a lot of it is just um having someone say, first of all, you you you have to develop trust. We're not here to take anyone's idea, and we're not here to get someone to buy a building or to lease a building from someone. We're not real estate people, we're not developers. We have expertise in those areas, but ultimately the goal is to create vibrancy in this community, to raise the economy, to create jobs, to remove buildings from blight, you know, to activate uh spaces, to have some growth between neighborhoods and business districts, right? There's 18 of them in Battle Creek, and we're working in all of them. But we're working in all of them through the entrepreneur, through the business owner, through the property owner. And this website doesn't replace having a conversation with someone like myself, but it does allow for people to enter anytime they want and to check it out. And when they feel comfortable, at least ways now they they can kind of go through the list ahead of talking to anyone and be familiar with the idea of that these seven steps exist. This regulatory environment exists. These are requirements everyone must meet. And then when they come to me, they can instead of saying, I never heard of this, I had no idea. They can say, Yeah, I have a little bit of idea. I looked at the website, I didn't understand it was that complicated.

Richard Piet 19:50

Yeah, and they're further along in their understanding of it than they might have been had they not seen that. And now you're you're starting them from square one. Now they've they've made some progress in that thinking. Yep.

Final Advice And Where To Start

John Hart 20:03

Yeah, it's very helpful to us. It means that we can touch more people, right? No one has to stand and wait in line. And it's not about me, again, it's not about necessarily meeting with me or the agency of which I work. It's like you you can do this on your own right now, but please reach out to us. All of us are available. But if you already have an idea of what it takes, then it just makes the process a lot easier, right? You can come prepared. You can you can take a little more time, you can find out that Northern Initiatives exist and they run a business cohort, and you might it might take you a couple tries to get in these cohorts because they're very popular. But that's that still leads you lots of other time to study the other six steps, you know, to figure out how to get into business.

Richard Piet 20:48

So all right. Well, if we leave you with any thoughts, it is that if you have an idea for a business and you want to situate it in Battle Creek, uh, maybe even elsewhere, but the idea between uh behind this particular site is Battle Creek, of course. Go look at that website. Open the number for BizBC.com. Open forbizbc.com. Have a look at what John's talking about there, that information. And then if you do have questions, the Small Business Development Office in Battle Creek is ready to help. John and his team are standing by and ready to have a conversation about perhaps what you've read in those resources, or maybe more about your idea. John, this is uh a tremendous resource, and we appreciate you and your team being there to help us through it.

John Hart 21:42

Well, you know what? It's it's very rewarding work. And like I said earlier in the conversation, um, we're not doing this at the expense of the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur is is helping us uh lead in the community, right? And we and we want them to be successful. It's not about just seeing how many businesses. We can launch in a year. It's it's seeing how many uh successful businesses uh we can launch and keep in business to sort of help spur our community growth. So if this tool's uh helpful to people, uh which we think it will be, uh, we'll be very satisfied with it.

Richard Piet 22:17

All right, that's where we'll leave it. Open for bizbc.com. Have a look or reach out and reach out to the Small Business Development Office. Yeah, Small Business Development Office in Battle Creek. John Hart, thanks for the update.