Happy New Year! For starters, we want to thank you for another great year. 2024 will forever be remembered as the year that we not only crossed the threshold of 30 B Corps, but also as the year we hosted BLD Southeast. Over four magical days in September, we hosted 250 attendees from 30 states and three countries, giving us the opportunity to spotlight some of the places and people that make our “good business” community so special. A hit panel from BLD Southeast, “If You’re Here For The Work, There’s A Seat At The Table” featured B Local Georgia board member Jamal Lewis (3rd-Right) and spoke to the unique culture of Atlanta’s changemaking leaders. Photo credit: Chat with Leaders Media. But as the calendar turns over to a new year, we’re excited for all that we have in store in 2025. We’re launching some bold new programming, have another great calendar of events, and will look to grow our board and our community this year. And after a December of strategic planning, including our annual board retreat, we’re excited to share our plans and welcome you to join us once again! New Programming After years of planning, we’re finally planning to launch our Student Fellowship pilot. In what we’re hoping can be copied by other B Locals, the program’s tentative structure will kickoff with a summer project in collaboration with B Academics’ B Impact Teams program, followed by a Fall internship with a local B Corp, and a Spring capstone project of planning an intrauniversity student Good Business event. Another Year of Great Events Like every year, we have another full calendar this year that will include events in both Atlanta and Athens. Thanks to our Volunteer Chair, Chad Livsey, we’ll once again be hosting quarterly volunteer days in both cities, kicking off in Atlanta on MLK Day, and with the next one in Athens on February 8th. And we kick off our networking calendar on April 15 at the Russell Innovation Center for Entrepreneurs. We invite you to save the dates below and join us for as many of the events as possible! More events will be added as the year progresses. Want to collaborate on an event with us? Let us know! Growing Community & Committing to Impact
2024 was the year we finally hit 30 B Corps in the state of Georgia. And we plan to continue that growth in 2025, with a firm commitment to continuing our intentional efforts to build a diverse and inclusive community of companies, and a good business ecosystem that works for everyone throughout the state. In 2025, we hope to not only hit 40 B Corps, but also to extend our reach outside of our two core hubs, Atlanta and Athens. We’re waiting for our first Augusta B Corp to finish their final verification, and then hope to begin building a community there. We’re also hoping to spend more time in Savannah, Columbus, and Macon. To achieve all of this, we need you at events, we need you spreading the word, and we need your help. And that’s why, at the end of 2024, we launched our first ever capital campaign, hoping to raise $100,000 to support more regional programming, additional certification cohorts that can kickstart those communities, and more frequent events in our existing hubs. To learn more, you can check out our announcement on our website. And to donate, you can visit our fundraising page. All donations are tax deductible. Onward Together We look forward to seeing all of you in 2025 and continuing to build this community together! If you have questions or want to get in touch with us, please do. You can use the contact form on this website or message us on LinkedIn or Instagram.
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B Local Georgia has announced its first ever capital campaign, seeking to raise $30,000 to support an expansion of their events, certification offerings, and volunteer outings. After six years of bootstrapping and surviving on a small operating budget, the nonprofit organization is ready to scale its impact and footprint across the state of Georgia. “This campaign is incredibly important to us as we enter 2025,” explained their Board Chair, Nathan Stuck. He continued, “We’ve brought on some new board members that have challenged us to dream bigger and do more, and we have some really big plans and objectives for the new year, but those are going to require a bigger budget.” Big PlansStudent Fellowship Launch Among those big plans Stuck mentioned is a new Student Fellowship program that has been in the works for several years now. The program will not only work to expand our academic footprint in the state but will give students at our HBCUs and PBIs the opportunity to host B Corp 101s, attend the annual BLD Southeast conference, intern at a B Corp, and plan quarterly inter-university student gatherings. Certification Stipends & Support Across Georgia B Local Georgia is also looking to grow the B Corp community across the state by providing small businesses with the resources they need to certify. Whether it’s helping them pay for consulting help or cover their certification fees, we plan to offer regional certification cohorts around the state, with their eyes set on Columbus, Macon, and Savannah. Increased Events In addition to hosting BLD Southeast in 2024, B Local Georgia was able to host three networking events that featured dinner, drinks, and a panel of experts. And while we were able to increase the number of volunteer outings, we want to double the number of networking events hosted in 2025 from three to six. With your support, we’ll be able to continue to host more events, like this collaborative July cleanup with The Chad Livsey Project in Castleberry Hill. Executive Director B Local Georgia was started in 2018 by Nathan Stuck. Since then, he made the organization an official “project” of Social Good Fund, a 501c3 fiscal sponsor. And Stuck has paid the fees and done a lot of our heavy lifting, annually donating 200-300 hours of volunteer time as a hybrid Board Chair and Unpaid Executive Director. With this capital campaign, we’re hoping to allocate a small salary to support Stuck’s work as E.D. and hold board elections for a new Board Chair. Our Founder and Chair/Executive Director, Nathan Stuck (far right) at an event in Waynesboro, GA to support Ebony Tree Farms. Nathan travels the state on our behalf to support and grow our community. Will you support us?Our mission is to uplift and support the journey of mission-driven entrepreneurs, businesses, and students across Georgia. With your support, we can give more to our community of B Corps and purpose driven businesses. You can give at any amount, but we hope you’ll consider joining us at one of these levels, with monthly payments available to help with budgeting:
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