St. Paul-based WomenVenture has added an office in North Minneapolis thanks to a donation by U.S. Bancorp and its foundation.
The office, located at 1030 West Broadway in the U.S. Bank building, opened on September 17 and will be led by Maliha Husain, a five-year veteran of WomenVenture who recently served as director of microenterprise development.
The move to open a new office is part of WomenVenture’s long-range plan that was adopted this summer by its board. One aspect of that plan involved geographic expansion.
The expansion was funded by the City of Minneapolis Great Streets program and the U.S. Bancorp Foundation. The U.S. Bancorp Foundation and U.S. Bank contributed office space and furnishings and provided a $100,000 grant to help fund programs at the new location.
According to Kim Roden, special assistant to the organization’s interim president, WomenVenture chose the location in North Minneapolis because of the available funding and the area’s needs for both business development and business expansion.
“We will work in collaboration with existing economic development organizations to ensure that a system for collectively providing business services is marketed to North Minneapolis and the West Broadway Coalition,” Husain said in a statement.
The new location will hold classes similar to the ones already offered at the St. Paul location. A franchise class, which helps potential business owners determine whether they are ready to buy a franchise, is expected to be offered at the Minneapolis office before the end of the year.
Roden said that the organization will use the Minneapolis location to determine whether further statewide expansion is in its future. She said the organization hopes to expand beyond the Twin Cities and that some logical areas to do so are Duluth, St. Cloud, and Rochester.
WomenVenture is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping women gain economic prosperity by teaching women skills to find careers with higher wages, navigate job loss and changes, start and grow small businesses, and manage their economic resources.
