How We Serve
CAPITAL - BGV Pitch, Supplier Diversity, Corporate Mentoring
The
BGV Pitch Program is an innovative way to help woman-identifying founders finance their businesses using the signature BGV Pitch model. Imagine Shark Tank meets Kickstarter, our unique model merges the traditional pitch competition with crowdfunding to create a mix of entertainment and entrepreneur-centered advocacy for Black and Brown woman-identifying founders. To prepare for the competition participants engage in a series of pitch practices where they receive thought-provoking feedback and pitch coaching to help them think like a funder and build like a founder. Founders pitch virtually or live in front of judges, while engaging their communities and networks through crowdfunding to gain access to capital. The audience votes with their dollars using our proprietary software, Raisify and we grant that capital back to the founders. 30% of what’s raised is put into a fund to invest in BGV Founders.
APPLY TO PITCH
The
BGV Supplier Diversity initiative bridges the gap between businesses owned by Black/Brown woman-identifying founders and large corporations. This initiative opens the door to low barrier access to obtaining long-term and sustainable contracts with large organizations for founders and provides a solution for corporations to create a robust pipeline for working with minority-owned businesses to diversify the impact of capital in the ecosystem. This includes pitch opportunities directly to merchants, feedback and insight from retailers on how to do business with them, and making introductions.
While becoming a supplier is great, founders still need connections to corporate employees to get the business. We have created a corporate mentoring session called the "
Customer Discovery Blitz" which activates up to 50 corporate employees with 20 of our founders in a 2 hour session. This event helps founders clarify their unique value proposition and gain consumer insights on how their products/services are perceived by various audiences. The participants do NOT need to have any special expertise to participate.
CAPACITY - Curriculum, Learning Opps, Pitch Masters Intensive
The
JetPack Curriculum was designed by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs. Our founder noticed that most entrepreneurship curricula were created as if the founders were already infused with capital. She created Jetpack, to begin with understanding money as an experience and to equip founders with the tools and resources to bring their ideas to life. We have released JetPack for Entrepreneurs, which is for the aspiring small business owners who want to launch their company, and JetPack for Leaders, which is the curriculum used for the BGV Fellowship. JetPack for Leaders focuses on further developing our Fellows from business owners to ecosystem builders.
BGV works with partners and community members to offer a variety of webinars and exclusive virtual learning opportunities. These are delivered virtual or in-person and are always focused on building community. We bring in speakers from various industries with expert insight to close the knowledge gap that spawns from America's racial wealth gap.
The
Pitch Masters Intensive is a 2-day bootcamp style engagement focused on moving founders to understanding the investor mindset, refining how they articulate their businesses value proposition, by practicing their pitches in a low-stakes environment and receiving feedback from peers and experts. Storytelling is a huge part of raising capital and we educate our founders to enhance their effective storytelling skills to create a compelling business narrative that will attract new customers, funders, and partners.
COMMUNITY - Fellowship, BGV Connect, Facebook Group
The
BGV Fellowship (Change Agent Fellowships) is a 9-month leadership development program created specifically to expand early-stage entrepreneurs' capacity and strengthen the local ecosystems of Black/Brown women founders! BGV incubates Black/Brown woman-identifying founders across multiple local ecosystems to amplify women leaders and create an “each one, teach one, to fund one” model for growing the long-term entrepreneurial knowledge and sustainability of underrepresented founders. Black Girl Ventures cultivates local leaders, who in turn cultivate their community as a service to the greater good of creating equal opportunity to thrive at the intersection of being a Black/Brown woman and an entrepreneur. Together, we create access to social and financial capital for Black and Brown Woman-Identifying Founders nationwide.
BGV Connect is Black Girl Ventures' virtual collective of Black/Brown woman-identifying entrepreneurs and business leaders innovating and bringing their creative vision to life. This is a community of small business owners who bounce ideas off of each other and give feedback to help each other sustain in business. Our founders call it a CEO'rority! This is where Black/Brown founders can find their tribe and voice.
Become a member to:
-Talk through challenges and celebrate victories.
-Peer to peer mentoring through weekly co-working.
-Share and receive exclusive resources.
-Learn from and connect with subject matter experts.
-Make new friends and business connections.
-Engage in culturally relevant entrepreneurial learning experiences.
-Access to business referrals and pitch coaching.
The
BGV Facebook Group is a highly moderated interactive group of women ranging from aspiring founders to established founders. This group has over 3,000 members actively sharing real-time experiences and resources. We ensure communication is clear of SPAM and that everyone feels that the group is an asset on their journey. This group is best for founders looking for a place to get insight into where to begin their journey and/or founders who want to find their tribe but are not yet ready to be a part of a more robust community like BGV Connect.
SBX - Leadership Development, Storytelling, Wellness for Founders
The
BGV Pull Up & Pitch hosted by Shelly Bell is a Shark Tank version of American Idol aimed toward normalizing business pitching, creating visibility for innovative ideas, supporting small business revitalization, and educating entrepreneurs on how to clearly articulate their unique value proposition through powerful storytelling. This fast-paced community-supported event allows Founders to pitch their business in 60 seconds, leading to two final rounds where our BGV Champions (Judges) determine the winners, and one of the participants walks away with over $5K in cash. Coming to a city near you!
Shelly Bell is no stranger to disruption, The founder and CEO of Black Girl Ventures Foundation is a disruption strategist, serial entrepreneur, mentor, and coach to BGV founders. With a proven track record of speaking to top business leaders and entrepreneurs across the globe to help them reimagine what's possible.
The SBX Leadership Intensive includes Shelly coaching BGV founders to think differently about transforming their businesses, diversity, inclusion, and social change to drive global impact and increase revenue with a focus on balancing wellness and business growth.
The Shelly Bell Show in partnership with Experian is a radio show launching on SiriusXM bringing you business and finance from the voice of three Black women small business owners and other experts as guests. Shelly Bell - founder/CEO of Black Girl Ventures, Sherrell Duncan - CEO of The Good Thick Training and Takia Ross - CEO of Accessmatized discuss authentic business experiences and give you the tea on how pop culture antics intersect with the world of startups, corporations and small businesses. Launching 9/5/21.
The
BGV Wellness Retreat curated exclusively for Black and Brown women entrepreneurs offers the space for them to navigate the personal challenges of their entrepreneurial journey. They are equipped with space, tools, and strategies to empower them to achieve not just within their business but within themselves as business leaders and owners. We create an experience where entrepreneurs will have the freedom that society typically doesn't afford to experience breakthroughs and transform into the best authentic, healthy versions of themselves.
BGV NEXTGEN - Activating Student Visionaries at HBCUs
The BGV NextGen Program was created for the next generation of Black and Brown women-identifying entrepreneurs in mind attending HBCUs nationally. This experience will create access to capital, capacity, and community for student visionaries ranging from 18 to 24 years old. Student Visionaries will work through a curated curriculum in preparation for a demo day to show off their business acumen. Next they will move into a tournament-style BGV Pitch Competition, giving them a chance to win additional capital and rep their HBCUs! Additionally, they will also have access to Supplier Diversity opportunities to increase visibility to their businesses. We are ready to usher in a new age of dynamic black/brown women-identifying founders.
