RAPID CITY, S.D. — Have you ever had of an idea while you’re out and about that could evolve into a business?
You could be driving the kids to school or cleaning out the gutters, and suddenly an idea for a business pops into your head.
Elevate Rapid City is looking for those ideas.
Through a partnership with Builders and Backers and Heartland Forward, Elevate is looking to turn those ideas into a reality with the Idea Accelerator Program.
“If you think it’s a problem and you have an idea for, even a way to look at it, let’s take it from there,” said Mitch Nachtigall, the Director of Innovation & Entrepreneurship for Elevate Rapid City. “We just want to start at the beginning and then research and see where it might go.”
The program is meant to be an accelerator program. 10 Black Hills entrepreneurs will be given up to $5,000 to turn those ideas into potential businesses.
Officials of Builders and Backers say that no idea is a bad one. They say they’re looking for people that might not think their idea could be a business and for them to take a chance.
It could be an idea for improving a bike or a busy intersection, but no matter the idea, they want to hear it.
“They have a really interesting idea that to solve a problem that many people have, but no idea what to do with it or go ‘Oh, someone should build this, (or) ‘I wish this existed’ and they stopped there. Our mission is to get more folks to say ‘ok how can I try something?” said James Atkin, the Head of Community Engagement for Builders and Backers.
After you have your idea, the application process is pretty simple.
Fill out the five questions and submit your application before the August 15 deadline. The ten finalists will be selected in September.
And before you let doubt crowd your mind, Atkin says, you never know what can happen.
“If you have 100 people experimenting in Rapid City, will you find 20 scaled businesses out of that? Will you find 10 interesting ventures? Will we find 5 small businesses? What will we find? We actually get people to kind of take that leap,” Atkin said.