Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #102209

Janet Arnold Betts, MA, School of Public Health, Saint Louis University, 3545 Lafayette Avenue, Salus Center, Rm 473, St. Louis, MO 63104, 314-977-8222, bettsja@slu.edu and Clarence O. Hughes, St. Louis Produce Market, One Produce Row, St. Louis, MO 63102.

Overview: Managing a produce market business while following academic institution financial rules and community-faith-based principles is especially challenging. When holding to the principles of community-based projects, decisions are made jointly by all partners. Oftentimes, within a community-faith – business- academic partnership, these decisions are contrary to the standard operating procedures of any one of the individual partner groups. This presentation will focus on the challenges presented as a result of these differences from a business perspective.

Method: Qualitative data (interviews with project business manager, our product and design consultant, the academic institution's finance office, the grocery store manager, and community partners) and program records were gathered and analyzed using focused coding procedures.

Results: The data identified similar as well as unique challenges to conducting business in our project including: building trust among partners, store location and visibility, human resources procedures, money-handling procedures, product selection, building maintenance, transportation, computer connectivity and employee supervision.

Conclusion: Business plans developed for community-based participatory projects need additional time to address the lack of confluence among the operating procedures of various entities and recognize that traditional business procedures often do not transfer well into community participatory settings. More importantly, the business relationships must be developed to ensure project success.

Learning Objectives:

Participants will be able to
• describe factors influencing business decisions in a community-based project,
• identify barriers to running a community-based business within an academic environment and
• discuss options for building successful business relationships.

Keywords: Community Collaboration, Business Plans

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.