Wisconsin has recently seen a staunch increase in the number of women business owners despite a struggling economic atmosphere.
According to Wendy Baumann, president of the Wisconsin Women’s Business Initiative Corporation, an organization that promotes business learning, women have played a major role in creating new jobs in Wisconsin by starting businesses in all sectors of the economy.
“They are starting businesses in construction, IT, in service businesses and in retail, so that’s very healthy that we don’t just have women owning one market,” Baumann said.
An American Express OPEN report released in 2012 said Wisconsin has an estimated 119,200 women-owned firms, which generate $22.5 billion in revenue.
According to Small Business Administration of Wisconsin District Director Eric Ness, SBA has granted 277 loans to women business owners in 2011, which added up to a total of almost $78 million.
Ness added that from Oct. 1, 2011, to March 31, 2012, SBA gave 119 loans to women business owners, totaling more than $27 million.
SBA provides various measures of support to women in business, according to Ness. He said SBA trains women on how to start up businesses, works with lenders to secure funding and assists small businesses in obtaining federal contracts. The organization has centers located across Wisconsin in Madison, Milwaukee, Kenosha, Racine and Eau Claire.
SBA is currently developing a program that would expand federal contract opportunities for women business owners, granting them 5 percent of all federal contracts, Ness said.
“I’ve talked to some women entrepreneurs that have utilized the program and were successful in getting contracts,” Ness said. “It is ongoing and it is working from what I’m hearing.”
Baumann said WWBIC also continues to help women grow and develop their businesses through the availability of seminars focused on starting, growing and maintaining small businesses.
She added that women focus primarily on starting businesses that tend to maintain their size instead of growing.
“If we can harness those small businesses and get them to be million dollar companies, we’d have greater job growth and economic development,” Baumann said.
Baumann said entrepreneurship has proved to be a successful career for both men and women because of the flexibility that allows people to manage their business, as well as a family and personal life.
She added technology has played an important factor in the success of the business sector as well, because people can work from home via phone and computer connections.
Wisconsin Small Business Development Center Director Neil Lerner said service providers play an important role in helping women start businesses in Dane County.
He said providing open and friendly service while assisting new clients and increasing the availability of financing for women can encourage and guide them to start their own businesses.
“I don’t personally believe you can motivate a person, man or woman, to do something they’re not comfortable with or don’t want to do, but when they show an initiative to explore starting a business, then you can be encouraging and open to assisting them,” Lerner said.
