By Margo Adler
Wednesday, April 26, 2000
National Public Radio
This is morning edition
A group of women is trying to raise $25 million, $5 at a time. The women are executives, many of them founders of high tech new media companies Yesterday in New York they announced plans for a new loan program designed to help women start their own businesses. The program is called Count Me In. It's built around a massive publicity campaign on the internet that encourages ordinary women to lend small amounts of money to other women, a practice called "micro-lending." NPR's Margo Adler reports from New York:
Count Me In was the brainchild of Nell Merlino, a consultant who seven years ago came up with the idea for Take Our Daughters to Work Day, so she has a track record of success. This project combines several ideas: small micro-loans for women, women giving money to women, and the use of the internet to publicize the effort and raise funds. Behind the podium at the news conference were two potted trees with five dollar bills hanging from them. Count-Me-In's Nell Merlino:
Nell Merlino: "There's not a living soul who escaped that "How To Marry a Millionaire" show. Every media outlet carried that story. Imagine all that media power sending this message to women and girls: Better to be a millionaire than marry one."
Margot Adler: The room was packed with female executives from Wall Street firms, dot-coms, as well as companies like American Express and the Ladies' Home Journal. One by one each executive stood up to announce her company's part in the campaign. Romance Classics, for example, provided the television spot.
Commercial: "I started a flower business a couple years ago using my savings and a credit card. Business is great, and I wanted a small loan to expand. But the bank said no, business too small. Not enough collateral. We can change that through Count Me In."
Kay Koplovitz, chair of the National Women's Business Council said she originally thought the idea of women giving five dollar contributions was too small and the cost of processing them too large. She doesn't think that anymore. Jane Smith, the president of the National Council of Negro Women, said her organization represents one of the largest pools of women who are becoming entrepreneurs.
Jane Smith: "All we need is the money. We can give five dollars. Not one member of the National Council of Negro Women will be left out of this initiative because it has been based on a principle of leaving no woman behind."
There are plenty of micro-lending organizations in this country and overseas. Kathy Keeley has the title of opportunity innovator for Count Me In. She started one of the first micro lending organizations for women back in 1981 and has been involved in 30 other efforts since. But what's so different about this project?
Kathy Keeley: "We could potentially do 15,000 loans a year, whereas most micro enterprise programs are lucky if they're doing 50 to 100. ACCION is probably one of the largest giving about 500 loans a year in their programs. So we're on a whole different scale, the kind of lending we can do. We won't have to rely on a loan officer talking to each individual loan applicant. We can do this over the internet and through a credit scoring system."
Count Me In also wants to change how women are judged, or scored, in business loans. They say women often can't get bank loans. It's often because they have a more checkered career history. These days, most people get small loans by using credit cards. For larger loans, most banks ask basic questions: your credit history, your income, how old your business is. Count Me In has come up with a new scoring method that they say is less discriminatory toward women. Count Me In CEO Nell Merlino says their questions will include issues women often don't get a chance to discuss.
Nell Merlino: "How, oh, maybe their income has changed over the course of their life because they either had children, or were taking care of a sick parent or a you know, sick partner, or something, how long they've been making their product. I think women do business differently, or a little differently. And loan applications, historically have not taken that into account."
May 11th is the day that sites all over the internet will bustle with notices about Count Me In. Nancy Evans, co-founder and editor in chief of I-Village says they could cause a splash.
Nancy Evans: "We started talking about getting all the women who are now in this room to join together so that in one day we would basically blow out the servers on the internet."
That was a joke, of course. They want interest in Count Me In to bring money in, not cause a breakdown. The eventual loans that women will get will range from $500 to $10,000.
