Entrepreneur Spotlight: Tanaka Shipp
Owner of Queenshipp Tanaka Shipp is the founder and CEO of Queenshipp, an organization that focuses on youth empowerment through experiential education. Queenshipp’s mission is to empower all young people, including queer, trans, and non-binary...
Our First-Ever Impact Report
It’s been a transformational year at RMMFI. We served a record number of entrepreneurs in the Denver Metro area while simultaneously scaling our model to support new communities across the state. We reached $1 million lent and introduced our first...
Entrepreneur Spotlight: Zedraielle Thompson
Owner of ZesteaZed Zedraielle Thompson owns ZesteaZed, a soon-to-be food truck focused on Navajo tacos and Navajo tea. Zed, as her friends call her, was born and raised on the Navajo reservation in Tsaile, Arizona, and moved to Colorado with her...
Announcing Launch Grants and New Loan Limits
For most of RMMFI’s history, we’ve offered business capital exclusively through loans. We started providing some grants this past year, but they were limited to entrepreneurs living and working in Northwest Aurora and business owners who were...
From $500 to $1 Million Lent
We’re continuing to celebrate RMMFI’s millionth dollar lent by taking a look back at our lending program over the past 14 years. As of the time we reached the $1 million milestone, we had lent $1,016,966 across 329 loans ranging from $246 to...
Entrepreneur Spotlight: Jariatu Yillah
Owner of Israel Enterprises RMMFI’s first-ever loan went to Jariatu Yillah, owner of Israel Enterprises. Jariatu is an immigrant from Sierra Leone, and she started her business selling imported accessories more than a decade ago as a way to build...
Entrepreneur Spotlight: Daliah Torrez
Owner of Coffee Seasonings Daliah Torrez and her husband developed the idea for their business, Coffee Seasonings, a few years ago when they moved from Denver to Alamosa to buy land and raise livestock. Daliah has always enjoyed the atmosphere that...
$1 Million Lent to Colorado Entrepreneurs
We’ve reached an exciting milestone at RMMFI: $1 million lent to Colorado entrepreneurs! That’s $1 million in capital — backed by capacity-building education and mentorship — invested in entrepreneurs whose potential might have otherwise...
Jessica Sveen Selected as RMMFI CEO
We are excited to announce that Jessica Sveen has been selected as the Chief Executive Officer of RMMFI. Jessica has been serving as the Interim CEO since February when founder Rob Smith retired. She was selected by the Board of Directors to...
Making Capital More Accessible with 5% Interest Rates
For the past two and a half years, RMMFI has temporarily offered 0% interest on all loans as part of our COVID response. Our goal was to reduce the risk for small business owners as they navigated both the challenges and the opportunities created by...
Entrepreneur Spotlight: Betsey Kiehl
Owner of Alpen Flora Alpen Flora, which translates to mountain flower, was created by Betsey Kiehl in Vail, Colorado after one of her off-season jobs turned into a passion she couldn’t let go. Betsey and her husband moved to the Vail Valley in...
RMMFI Named an Official Colorado Startup Loan Fund Lender
RMMFI is excited to announce that we are an official lender for the Colorado Startup Loan Fund, which was introduced last week by the Polis Administration and the Business Funding & Incentives Division of the Colorado Office of Economic...