Business Expansion and Retention (BEAR)

In 2006, YSEDC formed the Yuba-Sutter Business Consortium (YSBC) to eliminate the silo mentality and provide businesses with the resources they need. It does not matter which organization a business calls, YSBC partners will be able to connect them to the right resources.

YSBC is comprised of 12 local and regional organizations that offer many similar and complementary business services providing resources, information, and training to assist business in maximizing its ability to increase profitability, expand facilities and operations, hire more employees, and lead dynamic economic growth in the Yuba-Sutter region. YSBC provides technical assistance for business attraction, expansion/retention, business financing and loan qualification preparation; business planning and counseling; tax credits, and workforce development and training. From this convening the Business Expansion and Retention (BEAR) program was developed.

The goal of the BEAR program is to prepare new and existing business owners and entrepreneurs to start-up and/or expand their businesses. YSEDC and its Consortium partners provide entrepreneurs and businesses with the tools, trainings, workshops, and one-on-one training to improve their chances of success. This program includes access to capital and financial readiness, technical assistance, direct business outreach, resource fairs, business data solutions utilizing robust software and business needs assessments.

  This program is highly scalable and can be used anywhere for economic development and business growth

YSEDC utilizes several core technologies to power its solutions to advance business startup and or expansion efforts. 

For its lending and financial readiness programs uses the following: 

Finastra – Consumer lending software. Finastra offers the most comprehensive portfolio of end-to-end lending solutions in the market - across syndicated, commercial, consumer, and mortgage lending. Finastra delivers a consistent, frictionless digital borrower experience for a range of businesses, corporations and consumers, whilst improving customer onboarding, increasing transparency and streamlining back-office operations. As well as reducing complexity, cost and manual processes, Finastra’s solutions provide a single platform to deliver efficiency and a clear return on investment.

Grant Management Systems (GMS). The GMS Revolving Loan Servicing Software is a robust & comprehensive system providing a powerful portfolio management. It is designed to handle virtually any loan program; it provides the day-to-day needs of portfolio management as well as complete reporting capabilities.

For data and impact, and business technical assistance YSEDC utilizes the following software platforms:

Placer.AI, a real-world location Intelligence software platform that provides insights into places, competition, foot traffic customer visitation. This software allows YSEDC to provide businesses with data so they can get accurate foot traffic counts and dwell time to better understand how promotions, holidays, seasonality, and events impact business. It assists with discovering true trade areas where customers live and work to focus marketing budgets on the ideal customers. In addition, YSEDC can provide competitive benchmarking, industry trends to leverage new market insights to build data driven strategies.

JobsEQ by Chmura. This platform offers data and analysis on demographics, industries, occupations, and wages and more.

GIS (Global Information System) that creates, manages analyzes and maps all types of data. It helps to understand patterns, relationships and geographic context to improve communications, better business management and decisions making.  

The Yuba-Sutter region is a smaller metropolitan statistical area (Yuba City MSA) and includes Yuba and Sutter counties and the cities of Live Oak, Marysville, Wheatland, and Yuba City.  The region struggles with high unemployment, a lack of a skilled labor force, and industry diversification. The unemployment rate in Yuba City MSA was 8.9 percent as of February 2023 and is substantially higher than the national rate of 3.4 percent. (Source: EDD LMI).

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey, the ethnicity/race distribution of the population of the Yuba-Sutter region is 49 percent white (non-Hispanic), 30 percent Hispanic, 12.20 percent Asian (non-Hispanic), 4.11 percent multi-race (non-Hispanic), 3.14 percent black (non-Hispanic), 1.59 percent American Indian, Pacific Islander or Alaskan Native. 

Although the BEAR program is available to all businesses regardless of ethnicity and race, YSEDC makes a concerted effort to connect with minority owned or underserved businesses within the region, specifically Hispanic and Asian owned businesses. Of the 5,200 businesses in the region, 20 percent (1,040) are owned by these demographics and unfortunately, they generally seek assistance within their own demographic which in turn can limit the necessary tools, access to capital and resources. Outreach efforts include strengthening partnerships with trusted Community Base Organizations (CBOs) to assist in increasing awareness and understanding of available assistance provided by YSEDC and its consortium partners and marketing on language specific radio stations and print. This increased knowledge will lead to strengthening their businesses, improving resiliency to survive economic downturns, and improving their bottom lines. 

Nurturing existing business base for long term growth and prosperity is essential for regional prosperity. Business, small and large play a crucial role in the growth of the Yuba-Sutter community by creating jobs, providing income to the working population, buy resources, sell products, bring innovation, fulfill daily necessities as well as create indirect employment in terms of people engaged in raw material production and those selling these products.

 New and existing small businesses are an important source of jobs. About 62% new jobs created are from the existing businesses establishments and about 40% from startups (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Business Employment Dynamics) 

The BEAR program aligns with all dimensions of the challenge, but most closely aligns with financial readiness, business development and support scaling. YSEDC and its consortium partners annually reach out to local businesses to assess their needs through business walks and surveys. The program is specifically designed with these needs in mind. The most common needs identified by businesses is access to capital, financial preparation, marketing, and business planning. By providing direct technical assistance, tools and resources through the program businesses can startup or upscale, create and/or jobs and indirectly influence the quality of life of the region.  

To understand the change or impact it is important to look at a logical progression from activities, outputs and outcomes and the relationship can be viewed as an “if a, then b chain of influences and benefits. For example, if the BEAR program provides resources and tools for businesses, then businesses acquire knowledge and gain skills to upscale or start up (Output). If business know how to develop a business plan or are prepared for lending, then they will be able to successfully be funded (Initial Outcome). If they are funded, then they will be able to increase their market advantage, grow, or startup (Intermediate Outcome). If they grow or start a business, then they will create/retain jobs and improve the quality of life for the region (Long-term Outcome).

The overarching goal of the BEAR program is to keep existing businesses from relocating, survive economic difficulties, assist with expansion projects, assist new businesses to start up, and increase their competitiveness in the marketplace so the region can thrive.

 To achieve this goal and the desired outcomes, YSEDC will provide the following activities:

• One-on-one direct technical assistance – Provided by staff or paid consultants and could include, financial and marketing plan development, QuickBooks Online trainings, educational webinars or workshops, etc.
• Access to capital – Provided either through YSEDC’s direct loan program, referrals/introductions to traditional lenders, alternative lending sources and leads to business grants.
• Language access (Spanish & Punjabi)- Provided by paid translation services or local community-based organizations.
• Business Outreach – Direct outreach to businesses by conducting business walks, resource fairs, networking events or surveys. Other outreach efforts would social media, radio and print media marketing.
• Sighting and Growth Data – Provide robust AI data on prospective clients, competition, foot traffic and location analytics

YSEDC currently serves the Yuba-Sutter region, population 180,000 by providing regional planning, infrastructure enhancement, and business attraction and serves 5,200 businesses in the Yuba-Sutter area: providing leads/referrals for businesses to access capital, trainings, and business technical assistance, and direct one-on-one technical assistance and financial assistance. The region is comprised of the counties of Yuba and Sutter and the cities of Live Oak, Wheatland, Marysville and Yuba City. YSEDC annually provides direct technical assistance to 3,500 businesses in the area and markets its programs to all 5,200 business in the region. The assistance annually creates and or retains 186 jobs. It is anticipated that 200 of these businesses will successfully utilize the trainings or assistance either to start or grow their business in the next five years. 

YSEDC is governed by a 23-member board which is comprised of representatives from the counties of Sutter and Yuba and the cities of Live Oak, Marysville, Wheatland, and Yuba City. Other members serving on the board represent stakeholders from private businesses and nonprofit organizations. 

In addition, YSEDC has been designated by the Department of Commerce, Economic Development Administration as Yuba-Sutter Economic Development District (YSEDD). As such, YSEDD is responsible for the region's Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy (CEDS) to guide the economic growth of the Yuba-Sutter region. Stakeholders include local government and special districts, the private sector and nonprofits representatives.

Investors in YSEDC include, Wells Fargo, US Bank, California Wellness Foundation, California Office of Small Business, Department of Commerce EDA, Northrop Grumman, Thomas Winn Foundation, Pacific Gas and Electric, California Water Service Co., Yuba College, Yuba-Sutter Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise Rancheria and more. To view a complete list: https://www.chooseyubasutter.com/investors.

YSEDC has built relationships with trusted Community Based Organizations, such as Alliance for Hispanic Advancement and Punjabi American Heritage society to ensure programs are made available to two of the largest hard-to-reach populations in the region. YSEDC staff holds 23 positions or offices for wide variety service organizations.

 YSEDC uses a variety of communication methods for outreach and engagement strategies, which include social media platforms, online marketing companies, online communications platforms such as Zoom, language specific radio, and direct in-person contact. YSEDC has found that in-person meetings at business locations has been very effective and improves engagement from the business community. For strategic planning initiatives a hybrid formant has produced a wider engagement from the community and social media platforms are effective marketing tools.

It is YSEDC’s vision to promote the availability of business resources, provide the tools and assistance businesses have expressed a definitive need for and ensure all businesses regardless of race, ethnicity, sex/gender identity and/or income have local access. It is YSEDC goal to:

Create and maintain a competitive region through innovation and economic development. Developing industry clusters is key for regional economic development as clusters have been shown to strengthen competitiveness by increasing productivity, stimulating innovative new partnerships and presenting opportunities for entrepreneurial activity. Strengthening existing clusters has the potential to entice similar industries and supplies to the region’s existing industries in agriculture, healthcare, manufacturing, aerospace, and government. Development of the clusters will have considerable employment ripple effects and improve the wage and tax base.

Develop, retain, and attract talent. It is imperative that the region understand critical in-demand education skills, competencies and knowledge that align with existing and evolving business and industry needs. Building a strong analytical strategy to build awareness among residents, businesses, and leaders are important drivers of economic development.

Foster Overall quality of life and place. Promotion and marketing for continued investment in regional amenities improve the livability factor and quality of life, increases the desirability of the region as a destination for businesses.

The Yuba-Sutter region is identified as an underserved community located in Northern California, with high levels of poverty and unemployment. It is the vision of YSEDC to foster a vibrant, prosperous and growing region through exceptional leadership and involvement of the community while building regional diversity, capacity and collaboration. In order to attain this goal, it is important to coordinate efforts to build, grow and maintain competitive areas of proficiency and innovation to drive the evolution of the region by attracting mor industries to the region, boosting entrepreneurial development and maintaining, promoting and expanding regional businesses. 

To ensure YSEDC is able to provide robust data analysis, it has invested in new technology. The most difficult challenge it faces in order to utilize this technology at a optimal are trainings for usage and the cost of the AI software technology