Looking for inexpensive commercial retail space in Chinatown or along the Hastings Street Corridor? (200 block E. Hastings – 200 Block W. Hastings).

Building Opportunities with Business (“BOB”)  is working with the City of Vancouver to implement their “Vacant Storefront Facade Program“.

Simply put, the City of Vancouver will – for approved projects – pay for improvements to a building’s facade up to an amount of $50,000 per building.  We have already identified the buildings with vacant street level storefronts in them in both Chinatown and along the Hastings Street Corridor and, in many cases, have the building owner waiting for us to find them a prospective tenant!

The benefit to you, as the potential tenant, is that we would use the facade grant as leverage to negotiate longer term leases, leasehold improvements, less expensive lease rates, etc.

For more information please email Randy at bds@bobics.org.  and leave him a phone number where you can be reached during the day

BDS@bobics.org

Joe's story. One of the many happy tales we hear at BOB.

Here at BOB, our employment team connects businesses to hire locally, connects local residents to jobs, and supports them to see it be successful in the long term.

Check out our latest news!  The link below includes:

• Joe’s story.  He started working at United We Can.
• Employer Profile – FROGBOX
• A selection of our current job connections.
• Upcoming Events

BOB’s Employment News – July 2010

Building Opportunities with Business is pleased to announce our new Consultant Fees Program, designed to help businesses and social enterprises gain access to top quality business consulting. If you need advice on building your business plan, marketing plan, project management, sustainability or other key areas BOB has $36,000 to go towards future ventures in the inner-city. Read below for further details.

The purpose of the Consultant Fees Program is to pay for consultant fees on behalf of local businesses and social enterprises to enable a timely response to business opportunities or issues.

Objectives of Business Project Consultant Fees Program:

The funds must be used to hire a qualified external consultant for a project that will strengthen the local business and result in community benefits from business operations in the inner-city, including: employment, procurement, environmental performance, smart growth strategies, increased sales and business viability.
Proposed Program Guidelines

Eligibility

Characteristics of target business and/or social enterprise applicants for the Consultant Fees Program:

• Must be located in one of Vancouver’s inner-city neighbourhoods.
• Existing businesses, start ups or ventures including non-profit owned social enterprises are all eligible.
• The business illustrates market viability including customer contracts, track record of sales and profitability of financial results and/ or funding in place.
• Business and respective principals are in good standing – i.e. legally and financially.
• Business management team has required industry and business expertise and has made a financial and time commitment to the project being considered for funding.
Local businesses and social enterprises should aim for community benefits accruing to Vancouver’s inner-city neighbourhoods, such as:
Procurement and Business Development
o Procures goods and services from inner-city suppliers.
o Currently, or willing to become, a member of BOB Business Directory.
o Implements policy and practices that reduce waste/energy use, increase recycling and re-use materials.
o Produce or provide “green” products or services that are relevant to inner-city residents and neighbourhoods.
Employment of inner-city residents
o Employs and accommodates people with barriers to employment, especially residents of the inner-city.
o A partner of BOB’s HR Services – e.g. SEP, Job Postings, Industry Nights, Business Links, etc.
o HR policy encourages and funds transferrable training of low-income residents.
o Pays a “living wage” – i.e. higher than minimum wage – to all employees.
Investment in inner-city business and community
o Located in the inner-city (e.g. Gastown; Chinatown; Strathcona; Mount Pleasant; False Creek Flats; Downtown South; DTES).
o Donates time and/or money to inner-city community development causes.
o Has displayed a strong track record of corporate environmental and/or social responsibility within the community.
o Invests in the business’ premises – e.g. green building upgrades and/or retrofits.
o Participates in BOB’s industry clusters.

Application and disbursement process

Submission of a Letter of Interest which should be no more than 1-3 pages to:

brian.smith@bobics.org

In your letter of interest please include:

1. A brief overview of the business: the stage of growth, target clients, # of employees, product and service offering, etc.
• Explain how the funds will be used, why this is necessary for business development, what the impact will be, and what the timeline for completion of each activity will be. Project must be completed by September 15th, 2010.
• Provide success measures indicate willingness to report on outcomes.
• Explain link between the proposed project and community benefits in the inner-city– i.e. jobs for local residents, procurement from local businesses, location in the DTES, etc.
• Explain consultant selection process: criteria used, etc. Or if the applicant has already selected a consultant justify the decision and consultant qualifications. Attach bios and/or CVs.
• Provide a project budget, total cost, amount requested from BOB, applicant contribution including in-kind and/or cash.
• Add any other considerations the applicant feels BOB needs to take into account to render a decision.
2. The completed Letter of Interest will be forwarded to BOB’s Review Committee for consideration among other proposals received.
3. The Committee may ask for more information or make a decision based on the information at hand and/or instruct the Business and Social Enterprise Developer to proceed accordingly.
4. The Business and Social Enterprise Developer will notify the approved applicants of the decision and prepare the contract between BOB, the applicant, and the consultant, as appropriate.
Other parameters of this Consultant Fees Program:
• Seminar/information session on the local green economy: June 22nd, 10:30-11:30am, at BOB (163 East Pender), attendance is recommended but not required.
• Application Deadline: June 25th, 2010, 5pm.
• Please submit your Letter of Interest, by email, to BOB’s Social Enterprise Developer <brian.smith@bobics.org>
• Maximum amount is $10,000 per client, although BOB is looking to contribute to 5-8 applicants, from a total of $36,000 available.
• Preference will be given to projects that will help Vancouver achieve its goal of being the Greenest City.

For more information regarding this program contact: brian.smith@bobics.org

For more information on starting a business or social enterprise in Vancouver’s historic inner-city visit www.buildingopportunities.org

Based in Vancouver B.C., Building Opportunities with Business (BOB) is a non-profit organization that is championing an inclusive revitalization process for the inner-city that values existing businesses and residents. BOB is a connector, a resource and a facilitator working to: strengthen the inner-city’s community capacity; identify and build on untapped business opportunities; improve employment opportunities and retention; and increase investment in Vancouver’s inner-city.

On the main floor of 163 East Pender in Vancouver’s historic Chinatown, we have a large room which is available for rent for meetings and events, it is also available as coworking space Monday to Friday from 9 until late. In addition to desks, chairs, tables, couches, we installed several lockable lighted display cabinets. This floor is retail grade, on Pender right across the street from Vancity. As a service to local residents and businesses, we are displaying wares, art, product, crafts, business cards, and marketing material free in these display cases. As you can see their are several empty shelves. Each shelf is over one cubic foot and can hold about 5kg of stuff.

We need your stuff to display. You can display whatever you want, for as long as you want, any sales or leads you may generate you are free to pursue to the fullness of your ability. BOB charges zero dollars for this and many other services. Space is available first come, first served, write coworking@bobics.org or contact a staff member.

Our plans to make the main floor of 163 East Pender available as shared workspace and as general purpose event space to support the community and entrepreneurs is still progressing.  Wanting to support the Vancouver 2010 Olympics as well as increase tourist visits to Chinatown BOB was happy to partner with the Cultural Olympiad and make the main floor available as gallery space for Trimpin: Sheng High.

The installation required a partial dismantling of our coworking/event space.  Current clients and potential future clients are allowed access to BOB’s own office space which has extra empty desks set aside for coworkers, as well as BOB’s kitchen, meeting rooms, and IT infrastructure but come mid-March the downstairs will be back to functioning normally.  We’re still looking for our 20 core coworkers, we’ve made the facility more wheelchair accessible as well as added more lockable storage which was a common request.  We’re working on sorting out the best way to provide minimum printing services as well as how best to lay out the eating area.

A complete list of what we’re already offering for the flat rate of $200 per month is:

• a work surface, be it a desk, a chair, a table, a couch, or the bay window, wherever you’re most comfortable.
• dedicated WiFi
• electronic whiteboard
• projector
• fridge
• microwave
• filtered water cooler
• secure storage for you bike
• lunch room
• wheel chair access
• keyless entry
• flexible working hours
• and more!

We’ve made pictures available on Flickr and others have posted more.  Contact Andrew “Muskie” McKay if you have questions or leave a comment on this post.  We created a flyer that we’re going to distribute to coffee shops in March.