Coastal Bend-area small-business owners have a valuable resource for business advice, training and mentoring provided free by SCORE Corpus Christi. Established 40 years ago, SCORE is a national volunteer organization with 10,500 members in 389 chapters, and is a resource partner with the Small Business Administration (SBA). SCORE Corpus Christi has its office with the SBA in the Value Bank building on Leopard Street.
SCORE’s mission is to train and advise small business owners, managers and non-profit organizations. The local chapter also conducts workshops on timely business topics, consults with individual clients and performs e-mail consulting through the SCORE national website. All of its services are free to the client, with occasional fees associated with its workshops.
For the past eight years, our SCORE chapter has published a business advice column in the Corpus Christi Caller-Times each Tuesday.
Our local SCORE chapter has 16 members; nine of them are active or retired business owners, five are retired business managers, one is an attorney and another is a college-level business professor. All of our business counselors have experience in a broad spectrum of industries and assist business owners with marketing, accounting, legal, business plan development, financial management and much more.
The client’s business needs are matched with the SCORE business counselor best qualified to serve the client. Our members have had many business successes and a few failures. We’ve learned from our failures and bring that experience and wisdom to our clients to help them avoid mistakes and achieve business success.
Our workshops are on timely topics like social media marketing, franchising, obtaining bank loans and advice on how to survive the recession.
The face-to-face consulting sessions provide individual business advice to help the client resolve problems and make critical decisions. At SCORE Corpus Christi, we are dedicated to educating entrepreneurs and cultivating the formation, growth and success of small businesses throughout South Texas.
Additionally, we have a counselor readily available for business counseling in Victoria. Our counselors also serve as business mentors to local business owners or those thinking of starting their own business. There is no limit to how many times a business counselor can meet with a client. Potential clients are assured that all information shared with a SCORE business counselor will remain confidential.
There are a number of SBA loan guarantee programs, and SCORE Corpus Christi helps clients access those programs. The local SCORE chapter functions as a technical assistant for special SBA loan programs, offering loans to businesses that have good credit ratings, but lack sufficient collateral to qualify for a conventional bank loan.
Contact SCORE Corpus Christi for assistance by phone at 879-0017, ext. 22, or by e-mail at score221@sbcglobal.net. Visit our website at www.www.score-corpus-christi.org, and schedule a one-on-one business counseling session today.
