Houlton is latest town to jump into entrepreneurial funding fray
Courtesy / Town of Houlton
Houlton Town Manager Butch Asselin and Community Development Director Nancy Ketch present the new $35,000 Houlton Entrepreneur Challenge on Monday.
Houlton is the most recent town to offer a funding incentive to lure entrepreneurs with a $35,000 Houlton Entrepreneur Challenge that will kick off Sept. 1.
The challenge by the town of Houlton, Southern Aroostook Development Corp. and Machias Savings Bank, is for new business ideas, existing businesses with a new idea or plan to expand and businesses outside the area considering investing in Houlton.
The winning business will get a package that includes a $25,000 forgivable loan and donated services by several areas businesses.
“We took the pieces of the other town competitions that we liked the best,” Nancy Ketch, community development director of Houlton, told Mainebiz.
She added that she sees the contest as an innovative approach to business recruitment and to enhance the mix of businesses in Houlton.
Biddeford was among the first cities to hold an entrepreneurial funding contest when, in 2012, a group of volunteers called the Heart of Biddeford offered $20,000 in prizes to each of three winners of its Main Street Challenge to help them through their first year. Each winner got a $10,000 forgivable loan from the city of Biddeford’s tax increment financing district and $10,000 in in-kind services, including six months of free rent.
Gardiner is offering $175,000 in forgivable loans, grants and free rent for business expansion to boost its downtown redevelopment program. Collaborators in the Gardiner Growth Initiative include private businesses and the Bank of Maine (now Camden National). Businesses accepted into the program get a maximum loan of $50,000 that may not exceed 50% of their total project costs.
Skowhegan started a contest last September for one downtown business to win a $10,000 forgivable loan plus reduced-rent storefront space, services and other incentives totaling $20,000. The contest was organized by Maine Street Skowhegan and Skowhegan Savings Bank.
And in early May, Gray-New Gloucester Development Corp. 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.
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