How an L.A. indie bookstore’s GoFundMe encouraged a smaller small business lifeline

On a Tuesday morning in September, Raymond Wurwand was in his Southern California house sipping tea and reading the newspaper when he transpired upon a story about struggling unbiased bookstores. The print headline read: “Backbone-tingling bookstore woes: Some shops, such as Diesel, are turning to fundraising to survive. Shelve 2020 as horror.”

© (Lucy Wurwand)
Jane and Raymond Wurwand at a community restaurant. The Dermalogica homeowners have dedicated $1 million in grant aid to L.A. smaller organizations struggling due to the pandemic. (Lucy Wurwand)

He turned to his wife, Jane Wurwand, and stated: “We have received to do a thing.”

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In partnership with Pacific Community Ventures and TMC Community Funds, the entrepreneurs of skin-care company Dermalogica determined to launch Discovered/L.A. Modest Enterprise Recovery Fund, a $1-million grant application to enable little minority-owned corporations in Los Angeles County continue to be open up in the course of the pandemic. Amongst the eligibility requirements: Candidates must very own at the very least 50% of a brick-and-mortar shop, utilize less than 20 folks, and present evidence of profitability before the pandemic. The Wurwands acquired 2,430 applications for the to start with round of grants — from eating places, salons and cafes as very well as gyms, retail stores and working day-treatment facilities. 10 have been randomly selected. Purposes for the 2nd cycle open Jan. 11.

“We developed Dermalogica as a result of marketing to tiny salons, so we designed our enterprise through promoting to tiny business people who have been devastated by COVID-19,” mentioned Jane in a recent Zoom interview. “So as we read the piece, we understood that could’ve been our tale, but we have been extremely fortunate. Our salons have been specifically like Diesel,” she mentioned. Diesel, a Bookstore, with locations in Del Mar and Brentwood, is just one of several organizations that have built public pleas for assist. “That is who employs the neighborhood.”

The longtime philanthropists ordinarily provide minority organizations micro-financial loans via their Wurwand Basis, but Diesel’s pandemic struggle put into sharp concentrate the have to have for direct, no-strings assistance — some tiny corporations just can’t on any far more credit card debt.

Some 7,500 enterprises in L.A. have forever closed because March 1, according to a community economic impact report published by Yelp in September — the premier variety of closures in any U.S. metropolitan region. Outlets and dining establishments symbolize the bulk of closures, with proprietors of color disproportionally impacted. A university research printed in May possibly observed that 41% of Black-owned businesses throughout the country shut down amongst February and April. The amount of retailers owned by Latinos, Asians, immigrants and women dropped 32%, 26%, 36% and 25%, respectively.

These closures are what worry Jane Wurwand. “The factor I’m fearful the most of just after this is, when we carry our heads and seem all over our communities and neighborhoods, I believe we are likely to see a whole lot lacking, and we have to rebuild our principal streets in our neighborhoods for the reason that if not we just don’t have a stage of relationship,” she explained. “I want to stay around the local bookstore and the local salon. I never want to dwell following door to the Amazon warehouse.”

A single new beneficiary, Rice and Noodle, has been keeping on by a thread this calendar year.

Lunch gross sales at the little Thai and Vietnamese restaurant fell by far more than 60% immediately after workplaces in the area closed. Proprietor Kwan Chotikulthanachai, 43, was pressured to lay off all her workforce. She hasn’t been equipped to spend entire lease given that Could, and she failed to qualify for Paycheck Defense Program or economic harm catastrophe loans. Cleansing and sanitizing materials have included a lot more expenditures. But with her husband or wife and chef, Son Ongjampa, she’s managed to cling on, her 8-yr-aged son, Hugo, and 6-month-old little one, Ethan, at her aspect.

When she located out Monday night via e-mail that she would acquire a $5,000 grant, she cried.

“I was so pleased,” Chotikulthanachai mentioned tearfully in a telephone interview Wednesday. “It is like I received the lottery.” Hugo joyously jumped and screamed. She called her mother in Thailand — who cried, way too.

© (Curtis Dunwoody)
Kwan Chotikulthanachai, left, inside Rice and Noodle with her loved ones. (Curtis Dunwoody)

“I am doing the job so tricky,” she stated. “This time has been extremely tough, but I are not able to give up. I will not want to near my cafe.”

Possessing a enterprise has been a dream for Chotikulthanachai. She grew up in the cafe environment in Bangkok, where by her mom ran her own location. She opened Rice and Noodle in 2018 with the aid of family members, and hopes sometime to hand it down to her son. “I simply cannot allow my spouse and children fail with me.”

Adrianna Cruz-Ocampo also sighed with aid this 7 days. The operator of U-Frame-It Gallery, a customized body store with locations in Tarzana and North Hollywood, closed her retail outlet for 4 months at the get started of the pandemic. Gross sales dropped up to 50% right after movie and tv studios shut down, stripping her of a reliable source of income. She gained PPP and Little Business Administration financial loans, but the latter revenue was sent to the erroneous human being she does not have the resources, but she’s obtaining invoiced for payments.

By means of it all, she held her employees on the payroll, making cupboards, tables and other items to organize the store though the doorways remained closed to the community.

Cruz-Ocampo, 55, held functioning, far too, irrespective of fears of contracting the virus. She has scleroderma, an autoimmune disease that helps make her susceptible to severe issues from COVID-19.

© (Jennifer Daigle)
Adrianna Cruz-Ocampo within her framing small business, U-Frame-It Gallery. (Jennifer Daigle)

On Tuesday morning, whilst she was finding ready for function in the bathroom of her Northridge house, Cruz-Ocampo opened an e mail: “Congratulations on the L.A. Little Company Recovery Fund,” it go through. “U-Frame-It Inc. has been awarded a Discovered/LA Recovery Grant for the total of $22,500.”

She screamed.

“I’ve been powering on rent, and this will assist me maintain my staff members,” she mentioned in a cellular phone job interview. “This is like a bridge, a lifeline, to get by way of a quite, quite challenging calendar year. This is a blessing.”

Cruz-Ocampo still left Colombia for the U.S. with her relatives when she was 9. Right after obtaining her associate’s degree in business administration from Pierce University, she acquired the frame store in the 1980s with discounts and a organization mortgage. She opened a next locale in Tarzana in 2000.

“It is like a Christmas present, a enormous Xmas existing,” claimed Cruz-Ocampo. “It makes me experience something very good about this Christmas. As bad as it truly is been, it is really ending really well.”

This story initially appeared in Los Angeles Times.