Cultivate is a nonprofit entrepreneur support organization that has been advising, training & connecting entrepreneurs from our business incubators since 2016. Cultivate continues to expand to reach aspiring entrepreneurs, small businesses and assist communities throughout Ohio.

We help entrepreneurs to keep building a better business with training programs, referral connections, tools, resources and business incubator facilities that are suited for each community. These incubators and advising centers are operated in collaboration with community partners, the Cultivate board, strategic members and our staff. Services to each community are supported with local funding that often is from the county, chamber, city, grants and local businesses.

Our core business trainings are centered around three main areas of the entrepreneurs journey: Business launch, Business growth and managing cash/access to capital. Tracking our impact is essential for each community collaboration. As of October 2021 we serve 128 members with 500 jobs, $27 million in member revenues and 60% of our membership are women owned businesses. Cultivate is managing growth to one new member a week.

About the Founder

Matt Yerkes has been an entrepreneur for 20 years and founded Cultivate based on the belief that “for most of us, entrepreneurship is the best opportunity that we have to change the trajectory of our life in a way that will impact our family for generations”.

Matt’s entrepreneur experience has been rooted in marketing, web and software technology but has also included commercial real estate development, hospitality, food service and nonprofits. Matt volunteers each year to advise hundreds of entrepreneurs and present 50 training presentations that reach over 1,000 entrepreneurs.