Entrepreneur Fair Provides a Vital Marketplace
On June 10, IMPACT partnered with nonprofit El Poder de Ser Mujer to organize an Entrepreneur Fair in Wheaton. We’re always excited to offer these spaces! They provide a vital marketplace for immigrant women entrepreneurs to connect with customers, which can help them formalize and grow their businesses.
Our friends at Hughes United Methodist Church generously offered their parking lot for the event. In addition to the 20 vendors who were selling goods and services, the fair also boasted moon bounces, face painting, and representatives from county resource providers like Montgomery College and WorkSource Montgomery. It’s also worth noting that youth volunteers from Wheaton and Einstein high schools (they’re also participants in IMPACT’s youth sports program) helped out at the event—earning all-important Student Service Learning hours!
Many of the women entrepreneurs are members of IMPACT’s Wheaton network and are participants in our Community Trade Academy, which supports emerging microbusiness owners. IMPACT Network Builders Carmen Hernandez, Valerie Salazar, and Danny Centeno have worked tirelessly to make the Community Trade Academy a reality.
We look forward to organizing more marketplace events in the future. They’re an important part of the three-pronged approach of the Community Trade Academy which offers vocational training in skills such as piñata or jewelry making; teaches basic business know-how; and provides marketplaces for learning how to deliver value to customers.
We hope, if you’re reading this, you’ll plan to come to our next entrepreneur fair and support both our local economy and small business owners—all while having a great time shopping!
Click here to learn more about the 20 immigrant women vendors at the June 10 Entrepreneur Fair.
