The Small Business Development Center (SBDC) has launched the Creative Entrepreneurs Initiative to help creatives learn skills that can be utilized in the tourism sector.
“We just had 30,000 visitors to our shores on Sunday, so we are looking at a lot of our cruise ships, and they are saying that not many authentic Bahamian products can be found in the stores,” said Eureka Smith, SBDC’s corporate communications manager.
“A lot of the products are Chinese made, so what we are trying to do is create an initiative giving some of our people a benchmark for hands-on experience, so they can create their own products.”
The Creative Entrepreneurs Initiative begins on August 5, and ends on August 25. It will ask participants to sign up and complete a craft-making workshop of their choice, as a prerequisite to apply for up to $10,000 in grant funding.
“We’ve launched a few initiatives this past month, with jewelry making, with soap making, baking, and with creating face masks, to give our participants some skills and some things that they can do benefit themselves. If they want to launch a career in it, it will be another form of income for them, knowing they have something that they can do,” Smith said.
She continued: “We had 300 persons who registered [for a crafting workshop], and we had to turn some people away, because we didn’t have sufficient space to accommodate them. This happened in Nassau and also the Family Islands. We had Long Island, Cat Island, Abaco, Exuma and Grand Bahama.
“We for sure will be launching other initiatives like Crafting of The Bahamas. We had jewelry making, and we had people from the community come in and teach students how to make jewelry, how to make headbands, and how to make soap, candles and bake. This is just the first part of it.”
The second part of the initiative will take participants into the classroom, where they will learn about the business of craft-making. “They will learn how to set up their business and even learn to build it from where it’s at, and this is where the trainers will come in,” Smith noted.
Article Source: The Nassau Guardian