Milk Money Co-Founder Announces Launch of The Initiative for Local Capital

Janice Shade, co-founder of Milk Money, has launched a new nonprofit organization to support investor education and financial literacy. The Initiative for Local Capital (or Local Cap, for short) grew out of the Invest Local education series created and delivered by Milk Money during 2015-2017. Local Cap will deepen and expand these educational programs and tools to help increase the financial literacy and confidence of those wishing to invest their money where their hearts and homes are.

“It was a logical step to migrate the investor education efforts from Milk Money to a separate organization,” says Shade. “From Milk Money’s Invest Local series, we discovered a strong desire among people from all walks of life to learn about how they can put their savings and investment dollars to work for themselves and their local economy by investing in local businesses, but their need for information and deeper education was beyond Milk Money’s capacity and scope. The work I'm planning with Local Cap will support Milk Money as well as the greater movement toward community capital.”

One of Local Cap’s first programs will support the growing interest to build a Women Investor Network (WIN) in Vermont. Last summer, Shade and Milk Money co-founder, Louisa Schibli, brought together a core group of women to explore ways for women to invest in women in Vermont. WIN is now a loose-knit group of women who meet periodically and, in March 2018, expressed interest in a more formal structure for the group. Local Cap is providing research, data, examples and tools to help the group create a WIN Investment Club in north/central Vermont. Local Cap will use this pilot program to develop a toolkit that it can offer to other groups that wish to create an inclusive learning environment, accessible tools and a supportive network to facilitate members’ increased knowledge and confidence to make local impact investments.

Milk Money’s pioneering work to facilitate local crowdfunding investments for Vermont businesses will continue in the able hands of Louisa Schibli. “I’m thrilled Janice is taking on this momentous task of investor education,” says Schibli. “As Milk Money grows and offers more ways for Vermonters to invest locally, Local Cap’s work will be vital to supporting their ability to make informed and confident investment decisions.”

Shade has already begun her full-time focus on building Local Cap’s infrastructure and initial programming. She will stay involved with Milk Money as a non-managing member of the L3C and on its newly formed advisory board.