FedEx delivers another small business grant contest to Maine
Photo / Lori Valigra
Devin Cook, executive producer of MIT Sloan School's global Inclusive Innovation Competition, is just one of several groups trying to entice Maine's small businesses to enter competitions for cash, grant and/or in-kind services prizes.
FedEx Corp. has become the third entity in recent weeks to entice small businesses in Maine to enter a contest with several prizes totaling $100,000.
The contest by the Memphis, Tenn.-based delivery service will be its fourth annual Small Business Grant Contest.
The contest will award grants to 10 small businesses, distributing a collective prize pool of $100,000, which FedEx said it the largest sum since the contest started. The breakdown of the awards is one $25,000 grand prize, one $15,000 winner and eight $7,500 prizes.
The contest is designed to help small business owners achieve growth and success, according to FedEx.
“Small business owners face a number of challenges, especially when it comes to securing the financial resources needed to take their businesses to the next level,” Becky Huling, vice president of customer engagement marketing at FedEx, said in a statement.
The contest is open to U.S.-based for-profit small businesses with fewer than 50 employees that have been operating for six months or more. The entry form requires a short profile of the business, four photos of the business or product and an optional 60-second elevator pitch video.
“The FedEx Small Business Grant Contest is a fantastic opportunity for Maine entrepreneurs who are looking to grow their business. The state is home to many small companies and it would be wonderful to see a strong contestant pool from Maine enter this contest,“ Jennifer Burke, FedEx local spokesperson, wrote in an email response to questions from Mainebiz.
The entry period is open now and ends May 30. Voting on the entries is from May 17 to June 13 and is open to anyone at fedex.com/grantcontest or via a social media platform of the entrant’s choice.
After a final judging period, winners will be announced July 11 at www.fedex.com/grantcontest.
Other contests announced recently include the Gray-New Gloucester Development Corp., which on Monday launched a three-phase competition to lure new or existing out-of-town businesses into one of the communities by offering the winner a forgivable loan of up to $15,000 and about $5,000 of in-kind products and services to help launch the new business.
And in late April, Devin Cook, executive producer of the MIT’s Sloan School global Inclusive Innovation Competition, told Mainebiz that the competition’s focus on raising economic prospects for middle- and base-level earners makes it a natural for Maine businesses to compete.
Among the competition's first-phase judges is Jess Knox, head of Maine Accelerates Growth and a founder of Maine Startup and Create Week. The competition will award 30 prizes totaling $1 million, with four grand prizes in four categories awarding $125,000 each.
Unlike other competitions like the MIT $100K, the $15K Colby College Entrepreneurial Business Competition and the $20K UMaine Business Challenge, which are primarily business plan competitions, the MIT contest will focus on both for-profit and not-for-profit companies that already have solutions focused on using modern technology to raise economic prospects among workers at the middle and base of the economy, Cook said..
Also in March, Gorham Savings Bank told Mainebiz it will raise its LaunchPad Competition to $50K from $30K in previous years.
And in mid-April, The UMaine Business Challenge, Maine's only business plan competition open to all Maine college students, announced the finalists from three different universities vying for $20,000 in prizes.
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