Chamber foundation gets $40,000 grant
Award will support initiatives tied to COVID-19 recovery
The funds will be allocated through the Main Line Chamber Foundation’s Fund for Investing in Talent.
The Main Line Chamber Foundation has been awarded a $40,000 grant to support the chamber’s initiatives that are tied to COVID-19 recovery for small businesses. The award was presented by the Wells Fargo Foundation.
The funds will be allocated through the Main Line Chamber Foundation’s Fund for Investing in Talent to support business owners’ efforts to return to prepandemic levels.
“While most of our chamber members have successfully operated remotely, these funds will help us to draw attention to restaurants and retail businesses whose revenues were significantly impacted by shut-down orders,” Bernard Dagenais, chamber president and CEO and president of the chamber foundation, said in a statement. “We are working to encourage the thousands of employees who power our companies to make a point of shopping local, particularly this year.”
The chamber is planning a marketing campaign for this summer that aims to spur employees of the chamber’s 900 corporate members to support fellow chamber members in the retail and restaurant industries. The initiative will have a particular focus on what the chamber said will be important back-to-school and holiday shopping seasons for many businesses. The programming will fit into the chamber’s Members First strategy, which asks members to give other members the opportunity to win their business.
The chamber also is creating additional programming for 2021 to help with small business recovery and is drawing attention to members through sharing content and providing recognition. One such effort was the chamber’s Celebration of Business Leadership, held on June 24, and included the presentation of awards to several small businesses.
During that event, the Small Business of the Year Award was presented to Tri-State Training and Safety Consulting of Folsom; the Growing Business Award was presented to Price-Turner CFOs of Berwyn; the Woman-Owned Business of the Year was presented to the Law Offices of Jennifer J. Riley of Blue Bell; and the Minority-Owned Business Award was presented to Minuteman Press in Bala Cynwyd and Philadelphia.
“Each of these businesses pivoted successfully during the pandemic and we share their stories to inspire others,” Dagenais said.
The grant was announced to Main Line Chamber of Commerce members on June 28 at a virtual Network at Noon program supported by Wells Fargo, which also supports the Chamber’s Society of Professional Women, the region’s largest peer-to-peer, women-inbusiness group.
“At Wells Fargo, one of our main goals is to help entrepreneurs recover from the pandemic and preserve the jobs they provide in their communities,” Joseph Kirk, Wells Fargo’s Community Bank region president for Greater Philadelphia. “Through our long-time relationship with the Main Line Chamber of Commerce, we have seen its success in delivering resources and technical assistance for the small businesses who are the backbone of our local economy, and we are proud to partner with them on this vital initiative.”
A Wells Fargo Foundation grant to the Chamber Foundation from 2020 was also focused on pandemic recovery for small business, creating programming for business leaders presented by the National Center for the Middle Market. Another more recent training for small business owners provided strategies relating to company culture.
“The funding also supports diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives underway at the Chamber as it helps companies that seek to provide more businesses opportunities to vendors and suppliers that are both diverse and local,” a press release stated.
The diversity supplier initiative for small businesses was an outgrowth of the DEI Roundtable that convenes Chief Diversity Officers with major employers in Greater Philadelphia and is co-hosted by the Chamber and the Urban Affairs Coalition of Philadelphia.