1000 South Australian women – many of them first-time business owners – have saved more than $1 million in fees thanks to the Malinauskas Labor Government’s Women in Business Foundations program.
1000 women have now taken part in the landmark program designed to support women to successfully start new businesses and create jobs with 40 per cent of small businesses in South Australia owned by women.
The $4 million Women in Business program was an election commitment and has two streams, a Foundations and an Advisory program.
The Foundations program – created for women new to running a business – is delivered by Adelaide Business Hub and includes mentoring and small group workshops to develop women’s skills in business management, finance and accounting, marketing, digital technologies and cyber security.
This level of training and support would usually cost approximately $1350 but is subsidised by the Malinauskas Government, costing participants a significantly reduced fee of $88.
The program has received a strong uptake from women across regional areas including the Adelaide Hills, Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island as well as metropolitan Adelaide.
Small businesses are key to South Australia’s economy contributing $49 billion each year and are our largest employer employing 300,000 South Australians.
The Malinauskas Government is committed to reducing the cost of doing business and our $14 million Small Business Strategy contains a further 19 initiatives designed to support small business owners to grow and succeed.
As put by Andrea Michaels
It is incredible that 1000 women have now completed the Malinauskas Government’s Women in Business Foundations program.
That’s 1000 women with the skills to successfully start and run a new business and employ South Australians.
We know how important small businesses are both to our communities and to our economy, contributing an incredible $49 billion each year.
The Malinauskas Government is going to continue to support small business owners including by reducing the cost of doing business – just as we have here by saving female business owners more than $1 million in fees.
As put by Women in Business Foundations program participant Bridgette Hasting, Barossa Helicopters
Through the Women in Business Foundations program, we learned how to run our social media with better engagement as well as how to build and maintain our website and online booking platform. Being a tourism business, we were also supported with strategies to market our business overseas.
We truly believe that without the Women in Business program, we would not be where we are today. Our personal business commitment to the program has proved invaluable to us for our ongoing business success.
