In 1997, two entrepreneurial women named Gwen Moore and Regina Nobles leveraged their experience with the nationally recognized Dallas City Homes community development corporation to launch a pilot microcredit programming Dallas. Their initial efforts focused on low income women whom they believed could successfully rely on self-employment to lift themselves out of poverty.
In 1999, the pilot’s success led to the formal incorporation of The PLAN Fund in partnership with the Grameen Foundation USA (GF-USA), the internationally recognized leader in domestic microfinance. This partnership allowed the PLAN Fund’s leaders to learn from Grameen‘s 25+ years of experience in microlending while being one of only two Grameen “incubator” programs in the United States.
In 2004, The PLAN Fund successfully graduated from incubation and became an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit.
In 2005, the organization began offering a host of business development services in addition to its traditional lending products, including financial literacy, entrepreneurial training and business coaching services. This transition led to a more broad-based services model that served a larger number of individuals while still providing loan capital to credit-challenged entrepreneurs.
In 2009, The PLAN Fund restructured its operations with the goal of increasing lending volume. The organization formally separated staff into lending and business development functions, allowing for more specialized staff as well as better and faster attention for our customers. Loan limits were increased from $4,000 to $6,000 and the focus of our lending activity shifted away from start-ups to existing businesses with at least one year in operation (that still could not access capital to grow).
On September 23, 2009, the PLAN Fund was proud to be certified by the U.S. Department of the Treasury as a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI).
Certification as a CDFI means that an organization meets the CDFI eligibility requirements. The CDFI eligibility requirements are described in the CDFI Program regulations at 12 CFR Section 1805.201. These requirements relate to an organization having a primary mission of promoting community development, predominantly serving and maintaining accountability to eligible Target Markets, being a financing entity and providing development services to our clients’ businesses.
Throughout its history, the PLAN Fund has assisted hundreds of people to start or expand their business in a variety of industries including:
- Auto Repair
- Beauty Products
- Book Keeping
- Catering
- Clothing Retail
- Computer Technical Services
- Construction and Home Repair
- Graphic Design and Copying
- Hair Design & Barber Shops
- Gift & Candles Services
- Janitorial and Cleaning Services
- Landscaping & Lawn Services
- Medical Equipment and many others
