Basically, they provide a worldwide platform to crowdfund interest free loans to small businesses!
OUR KIVA PROFILE!
The loan process was simple. We simply needed to share what the funding was for and tell a little about ourselves and our business. One really ingenius litmus test of creditworthiness is Kiva's requirement that each loan be partially funded by people in your personal network! After you reach that goal, (Ours was 20 people.) Kiva launches your profile to a network of worldwide lenders. Lenders use their paypal account so their bank information isn't just idling in Kiva. Plus, every dollar can go directly to the loan, while a corporate sponsor matches every loan, dollar for dollar! Our sponsor is Google.org
To enhance our profile, we worked hard on a video. It was harder than we originally thought to look at a phone and talk as if we were speaking to an actual person. To help with that, Daniel had me peak around the side of the camera so that he could look directly at me when he was speaking. The hardest part of the video was explaining how we had started Maid-N-Meadows. It required Daniel to speak about shutting the commercial dairy down, 9 years ago. It took two days and several takes. Every time Daniel started talking about that time, he teared up and had to stop to blow his nose!
It's interesting, nine years ago, when the Dairy Farmers of America (The cooperative that bought our milk.) fieldman stopped by to inform us that we did not have enough milk to be worth a stop to pick it up, no other words passed between Daniel and I. We both knew it was time to close up shop.
I was quietly relieved. Milk prices were rock bottom and we had racked up a terribly high feed bill over the winter. Daniel had just gotten a job with the Post Office to keep food on the table and he was driving back and forth to Louisville, Kentucky for training. He had spent the last two weeks milking the cows at about 7 p.m. and then again at 2:30 a.m. Daniel was living on caffeine. But the cows couldn't handle that schedule and our production tanked from an already dismal amount. The crux of it is this: Daniel had given everything he had to hold everything together....and it just was not enough.
Daniel was crushed. He had milked the cows in his herd for several generations. With each one, he could tell you their mother's name and their grandmother's name and some their great-grandmother's name. We were deeply in debt, but not a single cow went to the stock-pen. Later, Daniel did herd health for another dairy and leased his cows where they would be under his supervision. But I did not realize how deeply loosing the dairy still affected him until we made that video.
As of today, we are 51% to our goal of $10,000, for the last of the equipment we will need. Normally we would work a little longer until we could just pay our way with cash. This time we are in a pinch because we have restaurants and stores that rely on steady product.....product we will run out of if we do not resume production soon. So are asking for some help and would love it if you would consider lending to us! So many friends, family, and customers have been so supportive, not to mention international lenders! If we could reach a few more people, we could wind this up this week!
For those looking for funding, we couldn't recommend Kiva any higher! The staff have been supportive and the Kiva community has been generous! Follow their recommendations and have a plan for your business and the rest should take care of itself, Lord willing!
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