Help Save Alameda Wine Company
Donation protected
And help me save my livelihood. My name is Karen Ulrich and this year marks my nineteenth year in the wine business. It seems like just a number, albeit an admiral one, but gender bias was alive and kicking two decades ago when I tried to break in. The last ten years I have spent as the owner of Alameda Wine Company. I created this business, a wine bar and shop, not just for the community of Alameda, but as a place where women could feel safe, and enjoy and learn more about wine from another woman. There was nothing like it before when I moved to Alameda fourteen years ago--and nothing since.
As anyone in small business knows or who has an acquaintance, friend or family member in small business knows, the costs of day-to-day business are high and the margins very low. And then there is the unforeseen event, the large one, that pushes a small business to the brink of insolvency.
Alameda Wine Company is now at that point and I am asking for your assistance in this very trying time.
Alameda Wine Company is unique in so many ways. It was one of two businesses selected by City of Alameda to grace the revitalization of the historic Alameda Theatre. It was constructed from an empty shell, a razed doughnut shop, and was largely built by members of the Alameda community. From the general contractor to the architect, from the plumber to the sheet metal specialist, and too many others to mention, I made the point of hiring on-island as much as possible to make this business truly an Alameda business.
Most businesses do not survive their first year, much less a decade, and I like to think my business now has roots in this community, a community I additionally call home as a homeowner. The support from this community has kept it going, and has been tremendous, and tremendously patient, as I've wielded my way through the slings and arrows of being a first-time woman business owner who was just so lucky to open her doors at the precipice of the Great Recession.
The wine business is really all I know. I could be a good bookkeeper for someone or a consultant. I have fantasized about rewriting the wine menus for far too many Alameda restaurants. But I would rather stay put, at Alameda Wine Company, and keep putting that key in the door everyday and keep seeing your faces.
I need your support this one time. The community, the City of Alameda, and myself have invested too much in this little sailboat to have it be permanently docked for one bad wave in the sea.
I have less than a month to raise these funds. No donation is too small. My tenth anniversary is July 14, Bastille Day. Let's get there!
Thank you so much.
As anyone in small business knows or who has an acquaintance, friend or family member in small business knows, the costs of day-to-day business are high and the margins very low. And then there is the unforeseen event, the large one, that pushes a small business to the brink of insolvency.
Alameda Wine Company is now at that point and I am asking for your assistance in this very trying time.
Alameda Wine Company is unique in so many ways. It was one of two businesses selected by City of Alameda to grace the revitalization of the historic Alameda Theatre. It was constructed from an empty shell, a razed doughnut shop, and was largely built by members of the Alameda community. From the general contractor to the architect, from the plumber to the sheet metal specialist, and too many others to mention, I made the point of hiring on-island as much as possible to make this business truly an Alameda business.
Most businesses do not survive their first year, much less a decade, and I like to think my business now has roots in this community, a community I additionally call home as a homeowner. The support from this community has kept it going, and has been tremendous, and tremendously patient, as I've wielded my way through the slings and arrows of being a first-time woman business owner who was just so lucky to open her doors at the precipice of the Great Recession.
The wine business is really all I know. I could be a good bookkeeper for someone or a consultant. I have fantasized about rewriting the wine menus for far too many Alameda restaurants. But I would rather stay put, at Alameda Wine Company, and keep putting that key in the door everyday and keep seeing your faces.
I need your support this one time. The community, the City of Alameda, and myself have invested too much in this little sailboat to have it be permanently docked for one bad wave in the sea.
I have less than a month to raise these funds. No donation is too small. My tenth anniversary is July 14, Bastille Day. Let's get there!
Thank you so much.
Organizer
Karen Ulrich
Organizer
Alameda, CA