Announcement

It was a small piece of advice that led to big business for Housing Helpers Of Las Vegas.

Don Twining,






Las Vegas Real Estate Agent/Realtor



It was a small piece of advice that led to big business for Housing Helpers.

The company, which helps new Las Vegans find apartments and furnished corporate rentals, relies on walk-in business at its East Tropicana Avenue location, said owner Don Twining. Perhaps a 480-square-foot sign out front listing the company's specific services would drive in more customers. The reader board, a recommendation of counselors at the Nevada Small Business Development Center, cost Housing Helpers $50,000. But in the 18 months since the sign went up, it has brought in about $100,000 in new business, Twining said.

It's not the first time Housing Helpers worked with the center, which is an outreach program of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

In the past four years, the center has guided Housing Helpers through obtaining a business loan and buying its office building. The center paid for Twining to attend sign expos to learn how to get the most bang for his billboard buck. And in the next two weeks, Twining will meet with advisers at the center to discuss the results of an experiment in dividing Housing Helpers into separate divisions to understand where the company's profits and losses are.

"We wouldn't be where we are without the Nevada Small Business Development Center," said Twining, who noted Housing Helpers has expanded its staff from four to 13 workers partly through its work with the program. "They've walked us through what we need to do to take the next step in our business."

For Michael Graham, deputy state director of the Nevada Small Business Development Center, Housing Helpers represents the future of the outreach program's initiatives.

The 20-year-old center traditionally assisted any comers who needed help with a business idea. Novice entrepreneurs with basic questions about forming a business were on counselors' agendas alongside long-time executives looking to expand thriving small firms.

In 2005, that changed.

The center launched a two-hour class that educates prospective business owners on all the basics -- where to get a business license, where to look for financing and how to structure a corporation, among other topics. The objective: to funnel hundreds of people with the same startup concerns through a unified course so that the center "no longer has to use its human power to answer the same questions over and over again," Graham said.

"We want to focus instead on working with existing businesses," Graham said. "To do that, we have to divide clients into people with common questions that can be answered quickly and those who are farther along. Moving toward existing businesses will help us have a greater impact. When an existing company can grow from 20 to 30 employees, that has a great effect on the community."

The center's new emphasis on working in depth with existing companies is evident in its 2005 results.

The average time spent per client on business advising rose from 2.2 hours in 2004 to 3.52 hours in 2005, while the number of Las Vegas-area companies receiving business advice fell from 560 in 2004 to 466 in 2005.

The center boosted its performance in other measures in 2005.

Total capital formed, which measures the amount of financing the center helped businesses obtain, rose about 3 percent, from nearly $5.7 million in 2004 to more than $5.8 million in 2005.

Also in 2005, the center added a new indicator called contracts awarded. Through contracts awarded, the organization is tracking the dollar value of public and private vendor contracts that it helps clients obtain. Contracts awarded in 2005 totaled $10.1 million.

The combined capital formation and contract numbers translate into a combined economic impact of $15.9 million.

The center's budget in 2005 was $492,000. It is financed with grants from the U.S. Small Business Administration, and receives some assistance through UNLV, the University of Nevada, Reno and the Nevada Commission on Economic Development. Its advising services are free of charge to clients.

Like Housing Helpers, the 10-year-old Alan Waxler Group reflects the center's new tack toward working with established businesses.

The Alan Waxler Group assists corporate travelers and convention exhibitors with services such as chartered transportation, event planning, model and talent placement and the arrangement of golf outings and other tourism activities.

About a year ago, executives at the company began seeking advice from the center.

"Sometimes you see people playing chess, and as good as they are, the person standing behind them watching the game will always see moves the people playing the game don't see," said Alan Waxler, the company's president and chief executive officer. "That's what I wanted -- someone who could stand behind me and see what I might not see."

With the center's help, Waxler added software to chart financial growth, brought on a full-time accountant and created an umbrella corporation over all his entities to structure the 118-employee business for a possible public offering. Center advisers have helped him find inefficiencies; the streamlining means "we're making more money, and we've been able to add more workers," Waxler said.

"Working with the center is probably the greatest single thing I've done for my company that didn't cost a nickel," he said. "If nothing else, it gives you confidence. It's about always wanting to do a little better to achieve a little more. They've encouraged me to do that. They've been nothing short of incredible."