Helping people from underserved communities start, operate, and build successful businesses.
Mission Statement
WIBO’s mission is to enable small business owners and budding entrepreneurs from underserved communities obtain financial success by starting, operating, and building successful businesses that develop economic power, provide jobs, and improve communities.
WIBO History
On March 1st, 1966 at the YWCA on 125th Street in Harlem, Walter Geier and Mallalieu Woolfolk offered the first inclusive and comprehensive training course ever conducted anywhere, How to Run a Growing Profitable Business. Since then, we have trained nearly 18,000 entrepreneurs who have created over 34,000 jobs.
The Workshop in Business Opportunities (WIBO) is a non-profit organization committed to assisting men and women to become successful entrepreneurs.
WIBO in Numbers
We Rely On Your Support
Even in these unprecedented times, some things never change—as unemployment and poverty rates skyrocket, the people getting hit the hardest are people of color, women, disabled people, formerly incarcerated people, and residents of low-income communities.
While charitable programs are doing their best to help in the short-term, nothing reduces unemployment and poverty more effectively than nurturing successful, profitable, locally created, small businesses by providing income and employment for the entrepreneurs, their employees, and the local businesses they buy from.
Yet, the majority of small businesses fail, and every study clearly says that isn’t due to lack of capital, and it’s certainly not from lack of effort.
Rather, failure is primarily due to a lack of business expertise.
The most powerful way to turn that around and ensure entrepreneurial success is peer-based training: providing aspiring business leaders with expertise and a network to provide ongoing support.
That’s the battle WIBO, the first entrepreneurship program in America, first took up 55 years ago, the fight to enable low-income minority and women entrepreneurs to not just open businesses, but to succeed.
- WIBO provides training to underserved, low-income communities, primarily through a peer-based program that enables participants to create complete, actionable business plans for their own enterprises
- WIBO is volunteer driven, primarily by alumni who have created their own successful businesses
- More than 90% of WIBO’s annual budget is covered by volunteer, in-kind support; government; foundations and fees
The last 10% is contributed by individuals like you. Your investment in WIBO will fill that critical gap
As WIBO looks ahead we hope you will support our mission to enable small business owners and budding entrepreneurs from underserved communities to obtain financial success by starting, operating and building successful businesses that develop economic power, provide jobs and improve communities.
