RCC Small Business Development Center amid Coronavirus Pandemic

Discussing what small businesses can do right now

Right now the coronavirus has thrown small businesses into uncertainty and the unknown.

Many are realizing that their income and operating costs are changing.

We're joined tonight by ron goss who is the director of the small business development center at rogue community college.

Thanks for being with us tonight ron.

Oh, you bet.

Nice to be here.

So what is the biggest concern for those folks who are sort of in limbo right now?

The biggest concern that we consistently see with.

Probably about 80% of the clients we've worked with about 200 businesses in the last 30 days as really just access to cash.

I'm either looking at these different sba loan grant vance programs or just trying to talk to us about what they could do within the business model they're currently running to just try to sustain our, retain the cas that they currently have.

So.

A lot of that, just talking about kind of, you know, how to be resilient and how to survive.

You mentioned the sba loan set up are the businesses you're talking to having success, getting access to that money.

Um, about 10 minutes ago i got an email, said one of our clients that just received their paycheck protection program loan, uh, from pupils bank.

So the that program, the paycheck program, it's actually administered during the local sba approved lenders, and i think you'll see a lot more activity here in the next few weeks of the local banks be able to fund those loans.

Any tips on how some business can be successful in that process?

Well, mainly it's just getting your application and, and making sure that you understand the two different loan programs that are available.

The, uh, economic injury disaster loan is more oriented to documenting an actual revenue or loss of business activity.

And so you're really looking at how have my revenues been impacted while the paycheck program is going to work better.

In a high employment or high labor cost situation.

So maybe you're in a lower margin business, um, but you have a lot of labor costs and you're going to see more financing available to you through the paycheck program versus the economic injury program.

But in both cases, you application process is fairly simple.

Um, and we're not the only resource, but of course the sbdc and our staff advisors.

It's more than happy to help those through that long process.

Are you seeing the businesses that are working their way through this process, get creative and change maybe how they do business or work with other businesses to get ideas and how to survive?

Well, yeah, brian, i mean, i think you've seen it probably just out and about.

Um, almost all of the restaurants, for instance, have now tried to sustain themselves with a takeout or delivery mode.

Um, you just see that in a lot of cases.

A lot of people.

I've been working on their websites trying to do more e-commerce.

Uh, we were talking today about some businesses are very creative in actually creating virtual experiences.

Like i take my ipad, walk around in my furniture store and i'm able to show you all the different things that we have for sale.

You could then complete the purchase online and the furniture could be delivered to that residence.

When you talk to businesses thinking about life after this, will they be able to get that labor force back in and get themselves up and running at the point they were before the process started quickly?

Do you think?

Um, i think it's going to take some period of time.

Um, you know what i mean?

We all want to feel like we're going to be resilient and we're all going to come together as a community or a state or even as a nation.

Um, but the lack of chashu.

The fact that it's going to take a while to get some of these business back up and running.

Uh, there'll be certain supply chain shortages just because businesses have had to change or reduce staff.

So i think there's going to be a ramp up that might take a while, but i really feel like, if nothing else, the feedback i keep getting is, you know, we just want this to be over.

And, uh, it's like, uh, after the superbowl, we all want to go to disneyland.

Sounds like disneyland might be a way off if you're in the labor force.

This may not be your area of expertise, but what kind of advice would you give to someone who may be struggling to wait for the end of the super bowl, get back to work?

What can you tell those folks?

Um, i think, you know, there was also some comments made today on the chamber of commerce cause on just trying to have people try to maintain a positive attitude.

And you know, i mean, my previous comment about disneyland, i'm not trying to be flippant about it, but i think there's just an up demand where people are really just desiring marmol street.

And i think when that occurs, you're going to see people just go out and want to reestablish their lives.

And, and i'm hoping, i mean, i know there's businesses and individuals that have been severely affected by this.

Um, but i, again, i think the strength of our community and here in southern oregon, um, hopefully you're going to see a lot of businesses and news organizations and public service organizations really up together to help people re recover from this and reestablish their lives.

That was there before this all started.

Ron mrcc and we certainly appreciate that comes true.

We look forward to all of this being over and we appreciate the information you provided for us tonight.

Thank you