Too many people struggle to make ends meet because they haven’t been given a fair chance. In the last 20 years, we’ve impacted the lives of thousands of small business owners who have created and grown tens of thousands of jobs. We invested more than $100 million in quality-job-creating companies and influenced a growing pool of tens of billions in impact investment capital supporting progress toward the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
In 2017 alone we provided 389 businesses across 50 states with access to capital and mentorship. Those businesses created or retained 2,583 jobs. Job growth at our companies was 21% — surpassing national (1.8%) and state (1.1%) rates. We also began our concerted work measuring the quality of jobs our companies created, and working with them to improve that quality over time. Average wages at supported small businesses were $30/hour (full-time) and $16/hour (part-time), 50% workers at supported small businesses have benefits, and 60% have paid time off.
2017 was another record-breaking year for our small business advising program. We matched 385 small businesses with a pro bono mentor in 2017. PCV business advisors volunteered 2350 hours – that’s almost $500,000 worth of free advice and coaching. We’re also proud to be one of the community investors to receive a 2017 CDFI Award from the U.S. Treasury Department. We rounded out the year by launching a first-of-its-kind report on common-sense policies to create quality job, and are preparing to launch Good Jobs, Good Business, a practical toolkit to help small business owners create jobs that boost the bottom line.