10-week business reinvention program offers additional strategies and concepts for business growth
Hannah Peura is a local entrepreneur, running a woman-owned retail business called Compass Rose in downtown Bemidji. Hannah has dedicated herself to Compass Rose since its creation in 2016.
Compass Rose started with online sales, as Hannah, with support and assistance from her husband Jordan, set up a makers-space in their garage. This expanded to a small retail outlet on the south end of Bemidji, and by 2018 they had secured a beautiful and large space downtown.
As with many small retail businesses, the Covid-19 shutdowns had a dramatic effect on this small business. A natural creative, Hannah recognized an opportunity to serve customers in new ways, and they pivoted to items like craft projects that customers could purchase online or pick up at the shop, and they promoted their online retail store. These retail online sales started to provide additional revenue opportunities, which eventually morphed into a separate line of products specifically designed for wholesale customers, such as other retail stores and resorts.
As this new line of products started to take off, Hannah reached out to the Community Revitalization team at the Northwest Minnesota Foundation (NMF) to explore financing options for equipment and working capital to support the expansion. Hannah and the lending team at NMF worked closely together to build solutions that worked for Compass Rose. A window of opportunity opened for Hannah and Compass Rose when NMF had the chance to test a business support workshop offered through Redstar Creative, a marketing agency based in Willmar, Minnesota.
“Business Reinvention” is a 10-week business reinvention bootcamp. Hannah went through the Business Reinvention program with seven other small business owners from a wide variety of industries. Most weeks there was homework and a two-hour online session where the business owners were able to share experiences and learn.
Topics presented and discussed included “Your Why”, “Creative Recharge”, and “Selling the Plan”. The Business Reinvention website explains, “Business Reinvention leads a group of hardworking, passionate entrepreneurs through a hands-on process to help them assess today’s challenging business landscape and create a new vision for the future.”
“At first, I was hesitant to open up about our business challenges and struggles,” said Hannah, in reflecting on her experience with the program. “(But) Redstar created a safe space with like-minded entrepreneurs to not only share about struggles and ideas for their own business, but to also offer insights to the other businesses sharing.
“The magic of the program was through this sharing of like-minds that are usually located in our own business-silos and not given this opportunity to pick the minds of others.
“The program asked challenging questions that I hadn’t taken the time to reflect on during the busy journey of entrepreneurship. It forced us to look at our business from a variety of perspectives and question each business choice we’ve made, now and for the future. It’s a process that I continue to use with business decisions, even after the program concluded.
“I would highly recommend this program to other businesses, with the advice to keep an open mind an engage with the other program participants.”
Learn more about Compass Rose here: https://compass-rose.com/
NMF will continue to explore the Business Reinvention course as a potential option for other NMF borrowers, particularly for those who have been in business for at least three to five years. You can learn more about the Business Reinvention course here: https://marketingunacademy.com/products/business-reinvention-summer-2023
If you are a small business owner or an entrepreneur with an idea, more info about Northwest Minnesota Foundation’s small business loan program is here: https://nwmf.org/business-support-loans/ Let’s talk! Our staff is eager to hear from you!