Rotary Creating Jobs in District 5240
 
“Traditional banks were not an option for me as they only looked at numbers on paper, however, WEV took the time to break things down and look at my finances on a personal level as well as get to know more about my business.”
In August 2012, the trustees of The Rotary Foundation approved the first grant to provide microcredit loans to low-income women in a developed nation.   The focus of the grant was low-income Hispanic women in Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties, California.
To ensure the success of the grant, the Rotary Club of Simi Sunrise, the District 5240 host partner and District 3720 in the Republic of South Korea, the international partner, formed a partnership with a successful Microfinance Institution – Women’s Economic Ventures (WEV). 
 
In addition to the loan fund, the grant was used to provide outreach to the target population including development of a business curriculum and instructional materials in Spanish. 
One of the recipients of a loan from the Rotary grant was Reyna Chavez, a young Hispanic woman with two young children, one of whom had developmental delays. This is her story.
In 2011 Reyna was working at a local hospital earning minimal money. It was the time of the Great Recession.  Reyna’s husband, a carpenter,  had lost his job and the prospects for finding another were low. Reyna had a problem. She had one pair of scrubs that she had to wear to work, and the material on the seat of pants was wearing thin from daily washings.  Stores that sold medical uniforms were closed when Reyna was off work. Then she had an idea that with the help of WEV and Rotary would change her life. Reyna saw that hard-working medical professionals needed a convenient way to shop for unique and affordable uniforms. She began dreaming of opening her own business.
Reyna’s business, Scrubs on the Run, started small. She began by traveling to local hospitals, selling scrubs from her car. Next, her husband created clothing racks in the back of his van so that she could carry more merchandise. In 2012 Reyna opened a retail store in Ventura. Then another problem arose. She got word that she was going to lose the lease on the store.
In 2014 Reyna came to WEV for a loan to replenish her inventory so that she could re-open in a new location. The WEV loan funded by the Rotary grant allowed Reyna to quit her full-time job to focus completely on her business. Today she has three employees and continues to expand her product offerings.
Reyna’s journey to financial stability started with her idea in 2011. When Women’s Economic Ventures and The Rotary Foundation joined with Reyna, all of the elements for success came together. On May 12, 2016 she was honored by as the WEV Entrepreneur of the Year for 2015.   You may have met Reyna at STEPS in 2015.
More than twenty businesses have been supported by this grant. As a result of the success of the outreach to the Hispanic community funded by The Rotary Foundation other local financial institutions have donated enough funds to make this program sustainable without any further Rotary support.