Schlichter Bogard Managing Partner Jerry Schlichter Featured in St. Louis Business Journal Article Highlighting His Role As Founder of Arch Grants
Schlichter Bogard & Denton Managing Partner Jerry Schlichter’s philanthropic vision in founding the Arch Grants nonprofit organization was recognized this week in a front-page article published in the St. Louis Business Journal, which described the significant impact the organization has had in the decade since it was established.
Founded by Jerry in 2012, Arch Grants was built to “disrupt[ ] the status quo of economic development . . . with a mission to transform the economy—in St. Louis and throughout the world—by attracting and retaining extraordinary entrepreneurs.” Arch Grants provides equity-free grants and access to an ecosystem of resources to early stage startups, helping new businesses grow and scale. The program, which has disbursed $11.5 million to more than 200 startups since its founding, has led to the creation of more than 2,000 jobs and has become “a beacon for entrepreneurs globally, developing the next generation of employers, civic leaders, and philanthropists for the St. Louis region.”
As reported by the Business Journal, Arch Grants seeks to extend its impact “beyond just the jobs and capital returns its portfolio companies have brought to St. Louis. It hopes it’s helped project a new sense of vibrancy and promoted inclusivity in a way that bucks St. Louis’ history of inequity.” The article further relays how the organization “contacted every historically black college and university and women’s college in the U.S. to inform them about the competition” at its inception; ten years later, the benefits of these efforts are keenly felt by the fact that “69% of the companies [Arch Grants has] funded are led or co-led by a woman, person of color, immigrant, or veteran.”
The full text of the article is available at: http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/inno/stories/inno-insights/2021/11/11/arch-grants-10-year-investment-return.html.
To learn more about Arch Grants, visit its website at: https://archgrants.org/.
