Opportunities and grants for food entrepreneurs with a new Foodprosvita course 27.04.2021

At the new Foodprosvita spring course, you can learn the what, when, and why of what to do when opening a gastronomy business. The application process has already begun: an intensive programme and starting platform are waiting for participants. According to the course terms, several grants, networking with experts, and great opportunities will be provided in order to become a Shop of Traditions resident and put their products on the large retailer’s shelves.

Shop of Traditions is a Silpo project to support and help grow small Ukrainian farmers and craftsmen. For ten years, Shop of Traditions has been searching for treasures among local products, creating food-craft infrastructure, popularizing high-quality and ecological small businesses, and supporting gastronomy traditions and producers. Foodprosvita is an educational project by Shop of Traditions that, for three years, has been teaching people who want to create their food story, dream about a small farm, or want to leave their kitchen and enter new markets.

‘Many amazing initiatives disappear in the beginning every year: because creators’ enthusiasm is not supported by practical knowledge of how to develop a business. Our mission is to provide this knowledge. This year, we have revised and updated the programme, having discussed it with post-graduates, and deepened the topics that interest food entrepreneurs the most, first of all, finance and marketing. In addition, we incorporated new material into the first module: business idea testing that helps an entrepreneur test out an idea’s sustainability and try to build a working business model. Many students who come to Foodprosvita are still looking for the right product for them’, Maryna Bulatska, Manager of Shop of Traditions, says.

The course programme consists of six topic modules:
- How to start a gastronomy business?
- Financial literacy.
- What documents prove the product’s high quality?
- Logistics and legal support.
- Marketing.
- SMM intensive course.

You may complete the whole course or pick individual modules. This option can be useful for those who have studied at Foodprosvita before. This year, the programme has been deepened and supplemented by workshops and the new SMM module, which has been created in partnership with the communication school Bazilik. During the intensive course, students will figure out social network algorithms and targeting and learn how to copywrite and take mobile photos. Every module is a few days of intensive immersion into the topic. Instead of inspiring cases, there are only useful illustrations to the topic and applied knowledge. The programme is built in a way that, for every student, their idea is the main topic. All 32 teachers of the spring course are some of the most interesting experts of various market areas: from retail representatives to creative agency stars.

To receive the grant, you need to send a motivational letter via the following link. https://foodprosvita.com.ua/grants

Foodprosvita already has its successful stories when graduates have become Silpo residents. For example, in the summer of 2014, Anastasia and Oleksii Konyush moved 30 beehives by two trucks from their hometown, Lugansk, to a new place—Bobrytsia, a village in Cherkasy oblast. In the beginning of a small family business, the experimental flavours of honey and other products were tested at fairs. In 2019, the spouses became graduates of the first course and believed in themselves. Since then, their cream honey has been selling on the Shop of Traditions shelves in 25 supermarkets around the country.

There are other successful graduates: Nadia and Natalia, two friends who used to dream about opening a coffee shop but, instead, they have opened one of the most popular Kyiv brands of cold-pressed oil, Only Oil, Wholeso Me. They found the first buyers among those they know and, on Instagram, and now, they produce up to 500 litres of craft oil per month.

‘When we came to Foodprosvita, we already had a facility and audience of admirers. However, we had no idea how to enter the next level and sell our products at stores. The most interesting thing for us was HACCP regulations and production establishment methods that, as a result, would allow us to offer our products on store shelves. We knew that we wanted to grow bigger while sticking to the regulations’, Nadia Bordenyuk, a co-founder of one of the most popular Kyiv brands of cold-pressed oil, Wholeso Me, says. Right now, the Wholeso Me oil, fibre, and seed are presented in more than 40 Silpo supermarkets.

The course starts on 11 May. Classes are held three times per week until 19 June in the Kyiv Silpo office, which is located at: Borschagivska Street, 154, Arcadia shopping centre. For people who prefer remote classes, live translations will be provided.

You can learn more and apply for the course via the following link. https://foodprosvita.com.ua

To be the first to get news about the school, new courses, and themed meetups, visit our Facebook page at facebook.com/fudprosvita.

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