(gentle piano music)
- Hello, everyone, I'm Scott Shigeoka,
I'm GoDaddy's Entrepreneur-In-Residence,
and I'm here at home, sheltering in place.
And earlier this week, I got to talk
to a roundtable of experts from Washington, D.C.,
who shared a bit about the updates to the PPP.
Today, I'm going to talk to small business owners
who have actually been impacted on the ground.
So, there's one small business owner
who has successfully applied
and is waiting to hear back,
there's one entrepreneur who decided not to apply,
and then there's another small business
that applied and actually got funding.
So, we're gonna talk a little bit about their experiences,
what they've learned
and if they have any advice
for other entrepreneurs out there.
I'm speaking with Yolanda, who runs a farm-to-skin spa
in Atlanta, Georgia, called Iwi Fresh.
And she applied for the PPP
and is waiting to hear back,
and she's gonna talk a little bit about her experience.
Hey, Yolanda, really exited to chat with you.
I'm wondering with COVID-19 goin on
and some of the relief efforts that are happening,
have you heard of and applied to the PPP,
and how did that experience go, if so?
- Yeah, so we was very excited to hear about the PPP.
I'm with a large bank, Bank of America,
and I think they were the first one that sent it to me.
So, we got it, it was just one form,
we filled it out, we sent it in,
and we thought, "Oh, that was simple."
Then we realized that it was little bit more in-depth
and it was a lot of more paperwork,
so we had to get our accountant involved.
And my accountant had to take over and help up fill out
all the paperwork, get it all in
and we would submit it.
Then we heard on the news that they ran out of money.
We've been out since March 19th, you know,
so we've already hit our month mark, April 19th.
So, now we're going into May,
and there's no money that has been circulated at all to us.
- Is your team still on payroll right now?
- A local company gave us a very small amount of money,
so we was able to get that,
just enough for me to pay my payroll,
to pay my staff, give them something,
and do a little bit of inventory.
I still owe my staff another pay period,
but I don't have the funding for that yet.
- Is there maybe something else about,
there's still opportunities out there,
even in the midst of this COVID-19?
- There's a lot of opportunity.
What I've learned from this,
is that I really need to put more energy
in my online sales, my online products.
Even when the doors open, I gotta have that.
I can't just have put all my money
into the brick-and-mortar,
I can't put all my energy in there.
I have to really push it.
So, I'm gonna be pushing my online sales
and my digital presence as though COVID is coming back.
- Do you have any advice for any other small businesses
who might be going through some of the same experiences
you're going through with PPP?
- (sighs) Apply, (laughs)
because you never know.
You gotta apply.
We don't have nothing to lose,
you've got nothing to lose,
so you might as well reapply
and just sprinkle some love around it, (laughs)
some good vibrations around it,
and pray and hope you get some money.
- Thanks, Yolanda, it was really great talking to you,
and I hope you stay safe and well.
- All righty, bye, bye.
- So, next I'm talking to Lizzy,
who runs a rock climbing business out in Bend, Oregon,
called She Moves Mountains.
And she ultimately decided not to apply for a PPP loan,
because it didn't feel like a good fit for her.
Hey, Lizzy, nice to meet you.
I'm a fellow rock climber,
and I'm curious to start with
how has COVID-19 impacted your business,
and so much of it occurs outside and in person?
- We're a seasonal business,
and so our season runs from the last weekend of March
until the last weekend of September.
And, right now, the parks around us are closed indefinitely,
and the parks in Washington are closed
until September 30th for the National Parks we operate in.
And so, at this point in time,
it has put a full stop to everything that we know.
- I'm curious, were you aware about the PPP,
and are you, or have you applied,
and if so, why or why not?
- I am aware of the PPP,
but when I looked into it,
it didn't make sense for us at all.
Basically, all of our guides are independent contractors
because of the nature of our work,
and some of them will only work about four days month
so they're not technically on payroll.
Even though I decided to pay them
for every single day of work
through the month of April their full wage,
it still doesn't qualify me.
And then we don't have a physical address,
so in terms of paying mortgage,
our gear storage is all at my house.
And so, the stipulations that were attached to the PPP
didn't make any sense for us.
- When you realized that you weren't eligible,
what was going through your mind
and how does that affect your business,
just trying to stay open
and support your wonderful guides and employees?
- As the CARES Act has rolled out,
I've realized that I'm just as on my own
as I was before any of it came out,
so it's a little disheartening.
I guess my feelings were feelings of stress
and helplessness for the most part, for a couple of days,
and then I've had to switch that
into being resilient and creative.
- I'm curious, where are you finding hope,
or support or community?
- At first, I felt incredibly alone,
that all of the decisions were mine to make,
that all of the people that work for me are mine to support.
And I'm somebody who moves throughout the world
with a lot of transparency,
and so I just shared what I'm up against
to the people who follow us
and follow me personally through our social media channels.
And we began selling hats with optional donations
and gift cards,
and also offering our clients refunds or credits.
The amount of donations that we have received
covered the payments that I made to my guides.
And so, it made it no longer feel like the burden is mine,
but it's ours,
in that if I ask my community for anything,
if I just let them know what I need,
that they're gonna be here.
- There's likely a lot of small businesses
and entrepreneurs who don't qualify for the PPP
or don't see the PPP as the right fit for them,
so what's the advice you would give to them?
- Stay resilient, be creative,
and humble yourself enough to ask for help.
I think people are so understanding right now
of the situations that we're facing,
but people can't help if they don't know you need it.
- Thanks so much for providing your voice.
I'm just so thankful for the time,
and just giving you lots of light
on this continued journey that you're on.
- Thank you.
- I'm gonna talk to Kevin, who's a co-owner
of Frite & Scoop in Astoria, Oregon.
It's a fries and ice cream shop.
And they applied for the PPP and received funding,
so he'll talk more about how that experience went for him.
- Hey, Kevin, thanks so much for joining me.
I was wondering if we could start off
by talking about how the application process went for you.
- The application process is very simple,
so it probably took me 15 minutes
to fill out the majority of the paperwork.
I think, a week and a half to two weeks later, at most,
we had heard back from our banker,
saying that we were approved.
And seven days later, we had signed the paperwork,
and the day after that, it was funded.
- Ah, that's awesome, congratulations.
I'm super-happy to hear that.
- Thanks.
- How did you feel when you learned you got the loan
and how did you find out?
Did your bank call you?
- It was a Sunday morning, and I got a text message
from our local banker,
and he just said, "You've been approved for the PPP loan
"for X-amount of dollars."
It gave me the feeling of
I stopped the temporary bleeding for now,
and we'll see what we can do with this money
as we go forward.
- What are some of the concerns you have about this loan?
- It's a very short-term help,
and it's an appreciated help,
but it's very short-term,
and I think, for most people
in very small businesses like ours,
it's a bandaid at best.
If we're gonna take on a loan, it has to be forgiven.
Because, I guess one of the other problems is that,
let's say, for some reason I mess up somehow
and I don't get all of this turned into a grant,
well then, I have to pay that back.
They say it's a very generous 1% interest.
Sure, but it has to be paid back in two years.
- Do you have any advice for small business owners
who might wanna apply for this loan?
- My only advice is, in a general sense,
apply for everything.
If you can get this loan,
at least get in the system and try to get the loan,
I would say go for it.
You can always worry about the details later.
I haven't spent a cent of the loan yet,
because I'm still being very cautious.
But I feel better about having the loan
in my bank account now,
than worrying whether or not I'm going to get it later.
It's stressful, no matter what,
but it's slightly less stressful
to have the money, than not.
- Well, thank you so much for sharing your story
and for your time today.
(air whooshing)
So, I hope this content and this conversation
has been really helpful for you.
It's really important for us to stay connected
and to stay in community as small business owners.
With the PPP constantly evolving,
we also need to stay up-to-date and informed.
So, if you go to openwestand.org,
we're including some resources and some links for you
to support you on that journey.
And if you have questions,
you can leave those in the comments below,
and you can subscribe to this video channel as well
to stay up-to-date,
and know that you're not alone,
that we're all in this together.
And I really appreciate your time,
thanks for much for joining me.
(upbeat music)