TRANSFORMING OUR COMMUNITY THROUGH TRAINING & MENTORSHIP
OUR PROGRAMS
Our mission is to transform communities by providing business training, mentorship, and visibility to potential customers. Our programs current focus is on minority & women owned startups with connections to the Westside Communities (West Greenville, West End, and Southernside) in Greenville, SC.
Build Confidence and Take Action!
Village Launch facilitates the CO.STARTERS Bootcamp to equip starters of all kinds with the insights, relationships, and tools needed to turn ideas into action through four hour, topically-focused sessions.
Whether you’re just getting started or stuck on a particular issue, these workshops will provide the jumpstart needed to get you moving.
A Solid Foundation to Launch!
The Business Entrepreneur Academy (BEA) is a 10-week, cohort-based program that equips entrepreneurs of all backgrounds with the insights, relationships, and tools needed to turn a passion into a sustainable and thriving endeavor.
Over ten sessions, they develop and fine-tune their ideas using the CO.STARTERS Canvas
Community & Visibility!
The Village Launch Market featuring Village Launch graduates and other minority & women-owned start-ups in the Greenville Area!
The market offers our vendors visibility and opportunity to test their ideas in the market. While having fun, building community with live music, food trucks, brewery and so much more!
VILLAGE LAUNCH & OUR ALUMNI IN THE NEWS
Growing together: Business owners defining the Village of West Greenville
Village Launch’s commitment to the Village is evident in the group’s name, but it’s also clear by the nonprofit’s dedication to the community members who live in and around the Village. Its Business Entrepreneur Academy (BEA) brings would-be or new entrepreneurs from the area through a program that schools them in everything from learning who their customers are, to building or revamping a business plan, to managing finances, growth planning and more. Over the course of 10 weeks, a cohort of 10-12 entrepreneurs learn the skills to launch their respective businesses, while benefiting from one-on-one mentors and a community of like-minded individuals. With three cohorts a year, the number of entrepreneurs being activated in the area shows no signs of stopping.
Three local ventures win inaugural GVL Starts pitch event
More than 25 Greenville entrepreneurs vied for a total of $15,000 in small business grants last week in a Shark Tank-style competition in the halls of the old Bank of America building.
Cultivating community entrepreneurs with Village Launch
Village Launch’s Business Entrepreneurship Academy (BEA) equips Greenvillians to start + grow their own businesses by teaching market research, customer development, financial planning, social media, and more. You may recognize BEA alum Javela Singleton of Gifted Hands Artisan Soap,
Village Launch Builds Resilience Among Under-Resourced Entrepreneurs
As the City of Greenville, South Carolina experiences unprecedented growth, Village Launch ensures its more vulnerable populations aren’t left behind.
Village Launch believes that economic development isn’t just a community-wide endeavor, but that economic development can also happen at the household level—in fact, it must happen there if residents of a city like Greenville are to survive gentrification and rapid development.
New market gives spotlight to minority, women-owned businesses
Minority and women entrepreneurs spent time with the Greenville community and introduced their businesses to potential customers in a new monthly market last Thursday.
The Third Thursday Market was started by Village Launch and will be held at Poe West on the third Thursday of each month this summer. The first market was held last Thursday and included over a dozen vendors, live music and the Project Host food truck.
How two Greenville nonprofits will help support minority businesses around Unity Park
"When you think of gentrification, you think of housing, residents being displaced, but not necessarily businesses also being displaced, too," Weidenbenner said. "I fear that same challenge happening here.
"In a 2014 plan for West Greenville, city staff spotted need for a small-business initiative to support more than 650 existing businesses that employ more than 6,700 people in the communities surrounding Unity Park.
New initiative aims at helping West Side businesses fight gentrification
As Greenville grows and development increases around the city, we sometimes hear the word “gentrification” thrown around. The idea that people in urban neighborhoods might be uprooted by developments aimed at the wealthy is an upsetting one. But what about the local businesses in these same neighborhoods? Can’t they be the victims of gentrification, too?
The answer is yes.
Village Launch to hold first fundraising event for budding entrepreneurs
Village Launch is planning its first fundraising event for Feb. 16, along the Reedy River at Genevieve’s at the Peace Center. A branch of the non-profit Mill Village Ministries, Village Launch hosts a 10-week, cohort-based program to help small businesses grow, fine-tune ideas and collaborate and network with other small businesses.
The sold-out event will raise money to continue to develop the programs Village Launch offers and expand access for more businesses and business owners, according to Rhonda Rawlings, community director of Mill Village Ministries.
Better Together
It’s impossible to talk about Village Launch without throwing in the cliche—because it actually does take a village. A sidearm of local nonprofit Mill Village Ministries, VL offers a ten-week business academy, mentorships, networking, and even a monthly market. But it’s more than that. It’s a haven for hustlers and entrepreneurs with big dreams but small resource buckets. Run by Jeanette Brewster and Rhonda Rawlings (yes, that Rhonda), these women are no strangers to the entrepreneur game.
National Mentoring Month – January 2022
Does Mentoring Entrepreneurs Make a Difference? If you ask any of the non-profit program leaders at SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives), Start:ME, Village Launch, or NEXT, they will respond with a resounding, “YES.” Mentors often make the difference between launch, success, and failure. Village Launch and Start:ME provide individual mentoring for founders enrolled in their programs; NEXT and SCORE provide mentoring without a formal training program.