I’ll bet you’ve never heard of the DHL Advancing Micro-Entrepreneurs Award Program. The program, a partnership between DHL and AEO (Association for Enterprise Opportunity) provides microgrants for low to moderate income entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs who are awarded a grant receive $1,000 cash on top of discounted DHL shipping services.

The program was started in 2005 by selecting three grantee organizations to select 30 entrepreneurs to be awarded with grants. The program was a huge success, and in 2006, the numbers were doubled. Six grantee organizations in different target communities were chosen to select 60 entrepreneurs to receive microgrants from DHL.

One of the microgrant winners was Derrick Miller of Chameleon Candle, a $29,000/year candle business based out of Miami, FL. The grant raised his profits by 400% because it allowed him to buy and ship in bulk (most of the products come out of Malaysia). This raised his per-candle profit from $1, to $4.

Resourceful Links:

• PDF file featuring business profiles from 2005 grant winners, and how it helped their businesses.
• DHL
• AEO – Association for Enterprise Opportunity
• AEO DHL Advancing Micro-Entrepreneurs Award Program project website. This site also lists the names of the organizations that chose the businesses in 2006, and may be able to point you in the right directions if you are interested for 2007.