By PledgeMe co-founder Anna Guenther.
Last week, baby Brie and I were at a conference called Electrify, run by the fabulous crew from Ministry of Awesome, focussed on supporting women founders in Aotearoa New Zealand.
I was up on stage with Brie talking about raising funds in Aotearoa, and some of the barriers women face. I was so struck by the questions I was getting asked about raising money as a woman, and more specifically as a mum (or someone who could in the future be one).
It’s shocking to hear how often women are asked about their plans to have children, and how that’s seen as detrimental rather than an added skill in the toolkit. Layered on top of that, women were more likely to be asked preventative rather than promotional questions and raise less funds than their male counterparts.
For those women, and even for Brie, I want to make sure funding isn’t a barrier that women face starting and scaling businesses.
So the PledgeMe team is making an offer to anyone who wants to “Electrify” their business. If you say Electrify when you’re signing up to raise investment, we’ll only charge 81% of the cost to prepare an equity campaign. That’s because currently, wāhine (women) in Aotearoa earn 81c for every dollar men earn (according to Mind the Gap).
And by offering this deal, we want to make it a bit less expensive for those of you that are ready to take control of your fundraising journey to take your business to the next level – by launching an equity campaign with Pledgeme might have already been hit by this pay gap – or even the investment gap.
What does that actually mean? That our normal preparation programme to raise investment from your crowd will only cost $3,240 (81% of the normal $4,000) which could be up to half funded by your local economic development agency.
We’re going to keep this offer open until the end of August. Get in touch if you have any questions, or just head over PledgeMe and request to run a campaign.
Please like, comment and share this offer so as many #femalefounders #femaleentrepreneurs can take advantage of it, as possible!
Anna
equity@pledgeme.co.nz
#fundfemalefounders
