Incubator Without Walls program honored

BANGOR – Within the walls of hundreds of business incubators nationwide, researchers, product developers and others intellectually feed off each other and encourage one another to come up with something extraordinary.

By definition, a business incubator nurtures young firms by providing management assistance, technical support services and access to financing. Entrepreneurial firms share office services and equipment in the same building.

The member businesses network with each other and help one another through the critical startup period as they operate all under one roof.

At Eastern Maine Development Corp. in Bangor several years ago, Debbie Neuman-Metzler was thinking about the concept of business incubators and how she could make that philosophy work for small businesses scattered throughout Maine. The small-business owners couldn’t, as the traditional definition of business incubator would suggest, work out of the same office and split the cost of expenses.

But they could encourage one another to come up with something extraordinary.

Neuman-Metzler developed a new definition of business incubator, and started the Eastern Maine Incubator Without Walls program. In towns throughout eastern, northern and coastal Maine, more than 300 business owners gather from time to time at locations throughout the state and share ideas on how to make their businesses successful, including receiving the training and resources they need to grow.

Now national organizations that track the progress of traditional business incubators are keeping tabs on the Incubator Without Walls project that Neuman-Metzler and several community development agencies that work with her are promoting. The program recently has been featured in a few trade magazines and newsletters.

Their efforts also have earned them a national award. EMDC and the Incubator Without Walls program recently received the “Pioneer Award for Promoting Entrepreneurship in Rural America” from the National Association of Development Organizations.

NADO’s awards program is funded through a grant from the Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

David Cole, EMDC president, said the Incubator Without Walls program gives small businesses in Maine the same personal advantage that those who actually work out of traditional business incubators receive.

“They build confidence,” Cole said. “A lot of people starting out in small business don’t know what they don’t know.”

By networking with other small-business owners, Incubator Without Walls participants are able to gain the knowledge to keep forging ahead, Cole said. Just being able to talk with someone else is all some people might need to be motivated to move on, he said.

“When you’re dealing with entrepreneurs, isolation is one of the biggest issues you’re dealing with,” Cole said.

When developing the Incubator Without Walls concept, Neuman-Metzler said she sometimes felt like the entrepreneurs she works with. She questioned if she was on the right track. “You spend a lot of time in the planning process and you wonder if it’s going to work,” she said. “Incubator supporters have energized EMDC to keep it going.”

EMDC’s partners for the Incubator Without Walls program are the Washington-Hancock Community Agency in Milbridge, Penquis Community Action Program in Bangor, Waldo County Committee for Social Action in Belfast, and Coastal Community Action Program in Rockland. The Office of Community Services, for Ellsworth and Machias, is joining the project.

The Maine Small Business Administration also provides technical training to some incubator participants.

Besides meeting in offices throughout the state to network, the Incubator Without Walls program managers put together a trade show for incubator participants to promote and sell their products. Businesses not participating in the incubator project can attend the trade show, Neuman-Metzler said.

The second Incubator Without Walls trade show will be from 2 to 8 p.m. Nov. 15 at the Bangor Civic Center. For more information on the Incubator Without Walls program, contact Neuman-Metzler at 942-6389.