New Address: Two Embarcadero Center, 8th floor, San Francisco, CA 94111     

Women Symposium Pre-Registration

Save the Date: Microlending Summit is January 9, 2014 in San Francisco.

  • Government Open!
  • Pre-Register: Food, Glorious Food Biz
  • The Goodies – This week’s highlight include FIELD’s ELM (squared) Fellowship to support the development of emerging leaders in the micro-business development field. The Requests for Application is available online. Applications are due November 15, 2013.

Government Open!

Just in case you haven’t heard…Seventeen days after shutting down the federal government, the Congress passed a short-term funding measure to re-open the government and stave off an impending breach of the nation’s debt ceiling. Everyone should be back at work and we can get back to micro-business as usual. As far as the national budget, we are working under the FY2013, which is a five percent reduction of the FY2012 budget due to the sequester. Read more about the federal government deal from Madison Services Group, our people in DC, and AEO.

We hope that Congress can come to some kind of long-term solution, so we aren’t in crisis mode every few months. To that end, AEO has launched a letter writing campaign “It’s Time to Get America Back to Work” that urges Congress for economic stability that micro-businesses (okay, all businesses) need to thrive. Take a couple of minutes and send a letter.

Pre-Register: Food, Glorious Food Biz

Join CAMEO for our 5th Annual Women’s Symposium
December 3, 2013 @ Los Angeles Federal Reserve
Tickets are $30, including lunch.

Pre-register today for Food, Glorious Food Biz!


There’s no better place to grow food, explore food innovations or market food than in California, so it’s no wonder so many CAMEO members are serving clients who want to be in the food business, many of them women. That’s why this year’s women’s symposium focuses on the food industry: business opportunities, tools, financing and policy. Symposium attendees will:

  • Engage in stimulating conversation on the relationship between Slow Money and Fast Food (or Fast Money and Slow Food).
  • Test out easy-to-use new technology that helps business owners (from start-up to growth) manage their financials.
  • Learn about business opportunities in health food and other cutting-edge food trends.
  • And, of course, participate in the networking and fun of a CAMEO event!

Pre-register today for Food, Glorious Food Biz!

Invite your clients, bring your staff!

The Goodies

New opportunities for trainings, conference information, funding, scholarships, and other information that have crossed our desks since the last Must Know: I have posted a running tab of current Industry Goodies on the CAMEO website that lists items that were in past emails. Check it out to make sure you’re not missing anything, like grants whose deadlines are still alive!

Funding Opportunity: Our friends at CFED announce their ‘Asset-Building Integration Learning Cluster.’ Learn more and download the RFP. Deadline is October 21, 2013.

White House Small Business Call: Small Business Majority hosts a monthly discussion series with representatives from the White House on the most important policies impacting small businesses.
These free calls, taking place on the final Wednesdays of each month, will feature the White House’s Ari Matusiak, Special Assistant to the President and Director of Private Sector Engagement. The next one is on October 30, 2013 at 11:00am PT. Register for the Chamber Chatter call.

For Your Clients: Mission Main Street Grants is a grant program by Chase to award twelve (12) small businesses with grants of $250,000. Application deadline is October 31, 2013.

Fellowship Opportunity: The ELM (squared) Fellowship – offered by FIELD in partnership with the Capital One Foundation — supports the development of emerging leaders in the microbusiness development field. FIELD announces that the Requests for Application for its second class of Fellows, is now available online. Applications are due November 15, 2013.

Fellowship Opportunity: The BALLE Fellowship is North America’s only fellowship dedicated solely to advancing the local economy movement, and where other programs focus on individual social entrepreneurs trying to scale single enterprises, we focus on local economy connectors – people who each represent, convene, and influence communities of hundreds of community entrepreneurs. Deadline is December 15, 2013.

New Report: FIELD’s newest publication “Sustaining the Delivery of Business Development Services” offers strategies and practices for mobilizing funding for microenterprise training services. It shares insights on how large-scale training organizations pursue resource mobilization and cost recovery to sustain delivery of services over the long term. Read the report or listen to the webinar.

New Report: FIELD has a new case study, Scaling Business Development Services through Distance Learning, profiles the experiences and lessons WESST has learned in developing distance-learning services to assist entrepreneurs across New Mexico. You can also listen to a recorded webinar on WESST’s distance learning experience.