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Make hers a $1 million business

Jewelry maker aims to win

East Bay Business Times - April 28, 2006

Rene Brice wants to meet Oprah Winfrey, and her entry into the Make Mine a Million Business Program may help put her on the road to Winfrey's Chicago studios.

If chosen, Brice, the owner of Oakland-based Classic Collection Ltd., will pitch her business plan to a live audience on June 2 at the The Westin St. Francis hotel in hopes of being one of 20 winners from across the country chosen in San Francisco.

The deadline for applications is May 12. Forty winners will be named in all, after a similar event is held in New York in the fall.

The program, founded by Count Me In for Women's Economic Independence, a New York-based nonprofit microlender, and OPEN by American Express, the financial company's small business segment, offers winning women-owned businesses a year of mentoring and professional coaching, marketing assistance, a technical assessment from Cisco Systems Inc., up to a $45,000 loan from Count Me In and a $10,000 line of credit from American Express.

Brice, a 2004 graduate of the Women's Initiative for Self Employment, started her handmade jewelry and accessories business out of her Oakland apartment in 2001 after being laid off from Bechtel Corp.

An e-mail from the Women's Initiative informed her of the program, which began in 2005.

"As soon as I saw it, I got excited because this is what I've been hoping for. I immediately went online and filled out the application," Brice said.

According to the Center for Women's Business Research, only 3 percent of women-owned businesses in the United States earn more than $1 million annually, and the program is out to change that.

The program's overall goal is to help 1 million women reach the $1 million revenue mark by 2010 and, according to Lexi Reese, OPEN's director of advocacy marketing, it is much more than a contest.

Reese said, "We view this as a movement. It is about shifting the economic paradigm of the United States."

Brice said winning would help her expand her business, which she has not done because she lacks the necessary technology (a laptop computer would help her field orders at trade shows) and resources for wider marketing efforts. Her goal is to show her work on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" and open her own showroom in Oakland or San Francisco.

"The Women's Initiative program was really good," Brice said. "It gave you the basics, like how to identify your target market, but after that it kind of leaves you on your own. And, how do you get to the next step without something like this?"

American Express also wanted the answer to that question and wanted to help those needy businesses.

"There are a lot resources to support startups, but, when you've been in business for two years and you have some revenue there is not a lot of attention or interest in these women (owned businesses)," Reese said.

"Declaring your intention to get to the million-dollar mark, so you are part of a community of people who are working individually on their businesses but also collectively towards this goal," Reese said, "is really effective in helping people shift their mind-set about their business.

"The mere act of making that declaration helps them achieve greater revenue growth than they did, before they even win anything."