Here is our Top 19 for this week celebrating work and successes to grow and strengthen the Great Falls regional economy -- Montana's Golden Triangle. And, sharing business resources and skill-building opportunities to empower your success.
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1) The Great Falls City Commission approved annexation and zoning for a 48-unit apartment development proposed by Skyline Heights, LLC. The Commission also approved downtown tax increment financing funds for the Civic Center Facade Renovation Project. Great to see these two developments moving forward!
2) 21 business leaders attended the first installment of our Attracting and Retaining Talent Series with national talent expert Chris Czarnik. Register here to access the recording, or attend one or both of the upcoming sessions on December 8th and December 15th from 11:00 AM-12:00 PM MST. All registrants will receive a free copy of Chris’s book Winning the War for Talent. Thanks to support from the SBA Small Business Development Center lead center at the Montana Department of Commerce, we're able to offer this series, usually costing over $350, for free.
3) Great Falls’ Cassiopeia Books, owned by New York relocatee Millie Whalen, was the inspiration for an article on independent bookstores by Livability Media. The article talks about independent bookstores as a way to know the heart of a city – and that’s true at Cassiopeia Books! As you shop this holiday season, remember to support small locally-owned businesses!
4) Our talent attraction initiative and website LiveinGreatFalls.com were featured on KRTV for helping recruiters attract talent to our region! Thank you to investors LPW Architecture for interviewing about the site and helping promote it in the feature.
5) Congratulations to three Great Falls Public Schools -- Loy Elementary, North Middle School and CMR High School -- on winning Purple Star Awards for going above and beyond to provide inclusive environments for active military families! See Tribune.
6) We want to update on Great Falls’ talent attraction efforts. We are currently managing three contracts with DCI: 1) marketing strategy, 2) website updates, 3) video project. In January, we will host a virtual event to present the 2021 marketing plan. We finalized the updated LiveinGreatFalls.com design and the 2.0 version of the site will be available February 15, 2021. The videos will be released early Spring. We are still working hard to engage with recruiters in town! If Soren reaches out to you or your team to be connected, please direct her to your recruitment team or HR department. Contact Soren at Soren@GrowGreatFalls.org or 406-836-0147.
8) We met with a property development group from Utah this week. The conversation was very productive and we’re very excited that Great Falls, Montana and Downtown Great Falls are now on their radar. If you know of a property development company doing work Downtown in other parts of the Northwest, let us know. Call Christian at 406.836.0136 or email CLeinhauser@GrowGreatFalls.org.
9) 10 entrepreneurs attended our December webinar, Engineering Growth in the Wake of COVID, this past Thursday. Couldn’t attend? The recording can be found at http://www.msucommunitydevelopment.org/smallbusiness.html. If your business is seeing challenges or opportunities as a result of COVID-19, reach out to our business advisor Nathan Reiff at NReiff@GrowGreatFalls.org or call (406) 403-4937. We want to see you survive and thrive.
10) What a week for business attraction leads! We had three leads come in that we are working and set three additional appointments with new leads for next week. If you have a lead on a business attraction project, call Jolene to chat 406.750.4481.
11) Did you know that business who are PTAC clients can get unlimited access to a multitude of free live and pre-recorded government contracting webinars? Now that Cyber Security is going to be a mandatory element for anyone who wants to work with the Department of Defense, this is a great opportunity to find out what is required and needed for your company. It is important knowing your proprietary and confidential information is safe from unscrupulous hackers or inadvertent mishaps. For more information on unlimited access to this resource, contact Shannon Clancy at SClancy@GrowGreatFalls.org.
12) Finish out the calendar year strong with our remaining December business trainings! Our business startup workshop The LaunchPoint is back on December 8th at 4:00 PM MST. And rounding out the year is Boots to Business, a two-day workshop December 17th and 18th designed to help military service members start their own business.
14) Save the Date for Ignite 2021! Friday, January 22nd starting at 10:00 AM MST we will be virtually hosting entrepreneurs from around the region announcing business startups, expansions, and more. Registration will open soon. Want to feature your project? Contact Nathan Reiff at NReiff@GrowGreatFalls.org or call (406) 403-4937. Projects include business startups, business expansions, real estate developments, and institutional capital projects.
15) Check out this awesome 🎁Holiday Shopping Guide🎁 from our partners at the Great Falls Chamber! They've made shopping local *easy* for you this year. Click here for a directory of Great Falls retailers - grab gift cards, ship from the store, or pick up curbside. Shop early so we don't crowd the stores and shop local to keep our businesses open!
16) Ever wonder what our business development strategies are? We meet with existing businesses to aid in their retention and expansion by linking them to resources to achieve opportunities and minimize threats; we work to attract new primary sector businesses to our region; we work hard to help projects at all stages move forward – our pipeline of projects; and we work to create and promote meaningful content for businesses of all stages.
17) Congratulations to the Black Lodge Singers, led by Blackfeet Nation member Kenneth ScabbyRobe on its 8th Emmy nomination!! See KRTV.
18) Michela Turnquist started work as our new Lending Operations Specialist. Welcome Michela!
19) Thank you to this week’s Investors in Economic Development, Davidson Family Foundation, for their Legacy Division investment, and Morrison Maierle for their Supporter Division investment. Your investment demonstrates the generosity of spirit and suborn optimism that is characteristic of our Golden Triangle. Every business is important to our communities’. Your support and leadership ensures ongoing business success in a most critical time, while helping pursue bright capital investments, and new jobs. To discuss investment opportunities, email Teresa or call 406.781.9499.
Take care and THANK YOU for supporting our wonderful local businesses throughout the Golden Triangle!!
Brett
Brett Doney
President & CEO
Connect with me on LinkedIn to network with the Great Falls Montana region. Forward the GFDA Top 10 to friends and colleagues. You can join our distribution list HERE or text GFDA to 22828.
"Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible."
Francis of Assisi
We are HUNGRY to Grow the Great Falls regional economy, create higher wage jobs, build our tax base, improve our market competitiveness, and enhance the quality of life and economic opportunity for residents of Great Falls, Cascade County, and the entire 13-county Great Falls trade area.
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Economic Development Services
See our Great Falls Economic Development Menu of Services which includes our expanded staff team. We provide award-winning and internationally-accredited economic development services throughout Montana's Golden Triangle, and SBA 504 loans statewide.
Cost-Effective Rail-Served Industrial Sites Available
If your company needs a rail-served, BNSF-Certified, shovel-ready site with all municipal services at your door, we have lots available for immediate construction in the Great Falls AgriTech Park. Contact Jolene Schalper at 1.406.750.4481 or JSchalper@GrowGreatFalls.org
November SBA 504 Loan Rates
The 25-year loan effective rate came in at 2.552%; 20-year at 2.523%; 10-year equipment loan at 2.417%; and, 20-year refinance 2.566%; 25-year refinance 2.593%. These rates are FIXED for the life of the loan and are inclusive of all fees. If you would like to find out how to get financing for commercial real estate and equipment at potentially lower rates than you're paying for your home mortgage, please contact Jill Kohles at 406-590-1056 or JKohles@GrowGreatFalls.org.
GFDA has two great career opportunities. We're boosting our lending team with a new Loan Officer position. We're going to post an alternate position of commercial credit underwriter this week. We really need someone to help with our underwriting and loan packaging because our lending activity is growing so much. And, we're looking for a Business Development Officer to lead our food processing, ag-processing, bio-processing and renewable energy business attraction and business retention/expansion efforts. Download position postings or visit our website. GFDA is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer and Lender. We encourage all qualified candidates to apply! Please help us spread the word.
Invest in Great Falls Regional Economic Development
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Events, Business Training, and Opportunities
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You are facing tough decisions right now. We’ve developed toolkits to help you decide what is best for your business. Toolkits include: Crisis Toolkit, Hibernation Toolkit, Business Resiliency Guide, Re-Opening Toolkit, and a Child Care Whitepaper. All of these can be found on our website.
Job Service Great Falls is hosting online Job Fairs on the first and third Wednesdays of the month from 10-11 AM. Employers should contact a job Service Workforce Consultant at 406-791-5800 to participate.
The USDA's Coronavirus Food Assistance Program (CFAP) 2 has almost $14 billion available to help agricultural businesses impacted by the pandemic. More crops and agriculture operations are eligible under CFAP2 than under the first CFAP program earlier this year. Farmers or ranchers can apply directly at www.farmers.gov/cfap or by contacting their local USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) Office. See full story on Montana Standard.
If you missed the Invest Downtown Great Falls event, don't fret, we recorded it! Make your way over to our Downtown Great Falls page to watch the recording and hear about Downtown Successes, Opportunities, the Visioning, and the announcement of Mountain Wave Distilling. While you're visiting our Downtown page, check out some more opportunities that are available in Downtown Great Falls! For more information or to inquire about some of these opportunities, call Christian Leinhauser at 406.836.0136 or email, CLeinhauser@GrowGreatFalls.org.
The Blackfeet Tribe announced a grant program to support Blackfeet tribal business owners whose businesses have been affected by COVID 19. For more information.
Montana's Incumbent Worker Training program just became easier to use. Employers can view the videos at their convenience to learn how to use these grants to fund skills-based training of existing employees. These grants area available to for-profit and non-profit employers with less than 50 employees in the state. We can help you with these if you run into a snag. Or contact the IWT program manager, michelle.robinson@mt.gov.
There are many documented benefits of remote working and there are unique stressors. We explored these stressors and management techniques with Erin Butts, GFPS, and the Stop the Stigma Team on a workforce focused webinar. In case you missed it, here are the slides which include contact information for Erin if you want to follow up.
A great food processing workshop is being offered by Headwaters RC&D. Basics of Running a Food Subscription or Community Supported Agriculture Programs, Wednesday January 27th, 1-3 PM, will cover the basics of, and differences between, subscriptions and community-supported agriculture programs. Topics covered will include pricing, packaging, building a program, fulfillment, and more. This program is for farmers, ranchers, meal kits, and food producers of all kinds.
The new relocation website LiveInGreatFalls.com is officially LIVE! This website was the #1 request we got from local recruiters and HR professionals for aiding in attracting talented workers to Great Falls. The Great Falls At-A-Glance two-pager is a great complementary resource that highlights Great Falls for people unfamiliar with our community. The Great Falls Livability relocation magazine is a new tool to help you recruit talent from out of town to relocate to the Great Falls trade area. For printed copies or to have a conversation about best practices for recruiting employees, email Soren at Soren@GrowGreatFalls.org. Let's talk Talent Attraction!
Attention all businesses doing government contracting: Are you aware of the regulations for Cybersecurity? Don’t know where to start? Check out this E-Book – Cybersecurity 101 for Government Contractors. By entering the promo code "4PTAC2020" at the checkout link, you can receive it for free. For more information and future trainings on cybersecurity or doing business with the government, contact our government contracting advisor Shannon Clancy at SClancy@GrowGreatFalls.org.
Great Falls Tourism has a host of resources available to help local businesses deal with the pandemic. Check out the resources at https://visitgreatfallsmontana.org/COVID-19/. If you are a business owner and need materials to help educate your customers on how to stay safe, Great Falls Tourism is here to help, contact Rebecca Engum at 406-761-4436 to arrange for material distribution.
The Montana Department of Commerce is offering business grants to increase your international digital marketing efforts. Read more here.
The Montana Department of Commerce’s Office of Tourism and Business Development has launched the “Montana Aware” campaign to promote safe and responsible behavior among those who are traveling in the state. Through the formal “Montana Aware” campaign, 17 of Montana’s Convention and Visitors Bureaus and six tourism regions share $5 million to promote the initiative. To download the partner toolkit visit MARKETMT.COM.
The Great Falls Livability relocation magazine is a new tool to help you recruit talent from out of town to relocate to the Great Falls trade area. Here is the online link to the magazine. For printed copies, and to have a conversation about best practices for recruiting employees, email Soren at Soren@GrowGreatFalls.org. Let's talk Talent Attraction!
We have Brownfield Clean-Up money that we want to put to work! Our low interest Brownfield Loans can be used to clean up hazardous materials including but not limited to lead paint, asbestos, etc. Are you working on a project that could use some clean up? Call Lillian today to discuss eligibility 406.750.1253 or LSunwall@GrowGreatFalls.org.
We are scheduling another Destination Creation Course which helps businesses increase their revenue, sales, traffic, and profitability. The proven 14-point business success strategy developed by internationally-known business consultant Jon Schallert teaches techniques to increase your ability to attract customers who are willing to go out of their way and postpone buying until they can visit your business. The Destination Creation Course retails for $399, and we are offering it FREE (for now) to Montana businesses. If you are interested in taking the course complete this survey to help us tailor the course to your schedule. Or if you have questions, contact Nathan Reiff at 406-403-4937 or NReiff@GrowGreatFalls.org.
Northrup Grumman is working to gather subcontractors for the missile upgrade project. This is a long process and they expect to gather information for three to four years. If you are a small business interested in doing business with Northrop Grumman, please complete the Supplier Information form at https://oasis-sbeforms.myngc.com/.
Manufacturers, if you're not engaged with the Montana Manufacturing Extension Center hosted by MSU, you're missing out on powerful resources, services, and networking. MMEC clients report cost savings of $160.3 million, new investment of $328.4 million, $1.3 billion in new and retained sales, and 6,186 new and retained jobs since 2000. We're proud to host an MMEC business adviser who covers the Golden Triangle region. Contact Doug Roberts at richard.roberts4@montana.edu or (937) 489-3985.
Of our online business planning tool, LivePlan, one said: "LivePlan is Awesome!" The LivePlan tool is helping her streamline her strategy in preparation for presenting to bank partners. We offer LivePlan licenses for free to active clients. Learn more about LivePlan on our website.
All of our recorded monthly business strategy webinars are available online for viewing anytime, click them out here.
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Vision
Hungry to Grow the Great Falls region
Mission
Grow and diversify the Great Falls regional economy.
Create higher wage career opportunities.
Improve market competitiveness.
The first economic development organization in the Rocky Mountain West to earn accreditation from the International Economic Development Council.
GFDA is a certified Community Development Financial Institution and a 501(c)3 charitable organization. High Plains Financial is a certified Community Development Corporation that offers SBA 504 loans statewide. GFDA and High Plains Financial are Equal Opportunity Employers and Lenders.
GFDA is proud to host a Montana Small Business Development Center, a Montana Procurement Technical Assistance Center, and a Montana Food & Ag Development Center. We are also proud to provide office space for MSU's Montana Manufacturing Extension Center.
For more info, click to our website.
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