Call for Indigenous Entrepreneurs

Are you an experienced, culturally-based small business vendor or food artisan? Are you an artist or performer looking to reach a cross-cultural audience? Do you identify as Indigenous to Canada?

We’re looking for Indigenous artists and small business owners with moderate experience (ages 18+) who are interested in sharing the cultural significance of their products/art form, and branching into an ecological sustainability-focused market such as Evergreen Brick Works.

Participate in a unique knowledge-sharing series, developed in collaboration with community partners with presentations by local Elders and current vendors. We’ll focus on strengthening cross-cultural communication and marketing skills, and product development strategies which can help connect your enterprise to new audiences at the Evergreen Brick Works markets and beyond.

Over the course of this opportunity you will access best practices in communicating the story behind your business, art, or performance. You’ll be presented with ways to effectively Grow Greener Enterprise through Traditional values and methods of production and sourcing today. Program mentors include experienced artists and artisans at Setsuné Indigenous Fashion Incubator, and entrepreneurial development professionals at Generation Connection.

After completing the 10-session series (schedule attached), participants can test their product makeovers and narratives at the Evergreen Brick Works markets, including the Holiday Market (December) and the Street Food Market (January – April). Artisans/chefs/collectives with products to sell will have access to subsidized vendor booths or performance slots.

As participants develop business brands on-site, further opportunities within our year-round markets will become available to those interested in continuing after the end of the subsidized program.

Entrepreneurial Development Series

• Saturdays from October 1 – December 3 (10 weeks)
• Participants must attend at least 7 workshops
• Morning business development: 9:30 – 12:30
• Afternoon cultural knowledge-sharing: Start at 1:00 (2.5-3 hours)
• Vendor & Performance Opportunities (At Evergreen Brick Works, 550 Bayview Ave.)
• Holiday Market: Dec 10th, 2016 – January 8th, 2017 (participants will select dates)
• Other Market opportunities: January – April, 2017 (participants will select dates)

During the Entrepreneurial Development Series, transportation and lunch options will be provided. Child minding services are available upon request.

For more information, or to submit your application form, contact Katrina at bruch@evergreen.ca

CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: DEADLINE: SEPTEMBER 23
Indigenous artists (18+, Toronto) for 2016 Growing Greener Enterprise Indigenous Vendor Incubator @ Evergreen Brick Works

About Evergreen

Evergreen is a Canadian charity and international thought leader. Since 1991, Evergreen has transformed public landscapes, like the deteriorating Don Valley Brick Works, into thriving community spaces with environmental, social and economic benefits. Evergreen acknowledges that the Brick Works site is built on Indigenous territory – on the traditional homelands of the Wandat, Haudenosaunee, and Anishnaabek Confederacies. We strive to honour the history of the land and waters surrounding us and the treaties that give newcomers permission to live, work and visit here. We are grateful to have the opportunity to work in the community, on this territory.

About Setsuné

Setsuné (set-soon-eh) means grandmother in the Dene language and we use it to acknowledge intergenerational crossovers, blood memory and oral histories expressed through fashion and the arts. The Setsuné Indigenous Fashion Incubator fosters the creation and exhibition of new works by Indigenous artists working in traditional and contemporary fashion, textiles and wearable art. Our partnerships with industry, galleries and allies promote Indigenous fashion and material-based art across diverse cultures and sectors. Setsuné Inc. is a social enterprise arm of the Incubator focused on the economic development and wellbeing of Indigenous women entrepreneurs working in retail.

About Generation Connection

Generation Connection is an emerging social enterprise that will provide educational services to entrepreneurs from marginalized populations. The systems that currently exist for supporting entrepreneurs do not adequately support marginalized communities. Generation Connection’s mission is to provide entrepreneurial education as the catalyst that will enable local entrepreneurs to develop and implement business, social, and environmental solutions to address local issues and opportunities. Generation Connection’s definition and implementation of entrepreneurship necessarily includes social and environmental entrepreneurship, where the primary focus of the enterprise is to address a social or environmental issue, while still achieving financial sustainability. Our approach is triple bottom line oriented.