Chase Mission Main Street Grant - help us be considered for $250k!

[WolfeMacleod]

Every year I think, Chase Bank does some sort of Mission Street Grant to small businesses. It's a $250,000 business grant. You sign up, answer some questions about your company, goals, etc, and then collect votes in order to be considered for it.
This is my first year singing up. Last year, I voted for Kauer Guitars. They had a hard time collecting the needed 250 votes.

Please, help us get there. We could do a lot with a $250k grant. - new employees, more equipment, an advertising budget, new product lines and tooling for them, etc. I've been running this company for 15 years now, and love what I do dearly. Unfortunately, some of the costs in tooling are horrendous. The growth is slow but steady, and the reputation is solid. We've lived solely on word-of-mouth for all that time.

http://www.missionmainstreetgrants.com/business/detail/19526

Click "Vote Now" on the right hand side. It may want to connect to a Facebook account.

Thank you!

[scottmandue]

Done...

Shine on you crazy diamond!

[Rick V]

Vote #38

[Nostril Cheese]

done

[stomachmonkey]

#43

[WolfeMacleod]

Originally Posted by scottmandue

Done...

Rock on you crazy diamond!

Originally Posted by Rick V

Vote #38

Thank you, both!

A $250k grant would allow the acquisition of custom tooling for things like plastic injection mold for 7-string and Fender-spaced pickup parts to be made. Currently available parts for those are crap quality, so I don't make them. But, I have a lot of demand for them.
A laser-cutter, which would allow in-house production of Fender-style "Fibre" parts, etching, tool and jig making, and production of similar parts for sale to others.
Additional coil winders and tooling for "gang-winding" which allows for a multi-bobbin winding setup and increases output. My coil winder cost me $15,000 in 2003.
Tooling for stamping parts that are unavailable elsewhere.
Advertising budget. We have none. Aside from several guitar magazine reviews, it's all been word of mouth (or screen)
Additional employees..prep-people and assemblers.
Test equipment
Long-term shop space.

We could do a lot with that.

[Rick V]

When you start tooling pickups for seven strings let me know, I would love to have some more bite in mine

[WolfeMacleod]

Originally Posted by Rick V

When you start tooling pickups for seven strings let me know, I would love to have some more bite in mine

I can rewind existing Duncan 7-strings. There's some older talk on sevenstring.org about some of that work I think. Those guys seem to liekt eh old-school JB sound that I do. Those are the same parts I can get from a Korean supplier... but I've run into a problem where the top and bottom flanges separate from the inner "core" due to the pressure of the coil on the flanges.. main reason I don't use those parts.

[craigster59]

Done. You're on your way Wolfe!

[onlycafe]

#49.
go get 'em wolfe.

[Rick V]

Beth (the wife unit) is #52

[stomachmonkey]

Cross posted to my FB page. Have a lot of musician friends. Maybe they will help.

At worst you may get an order or two.

Wifey voted, #62

[A930Rocket]

#63!

[911dean]

#64

[Hard-Deck]

Damn! A Faceplant account is required to vote. I wish I could give you a vote...good luck though.

[LWJ]

Done!

[LSA]

Got my vote, I'll take a pair the crunchiest heaviest pups you make with those winnings.

[onlycafe]

how many are you up to now wolfe?

[tevake]

My vote was #107, good luck wolfe in getting the grant!

Cheers Richard

[mudman]

#114
I too have some musician friends that will be voting!