LOCK HAVEN — In the past five years alone, the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) has assisted over 300 small businesses and entrepreneurs and helped start over 50 businesses in Clinton County.

The organization’s regional location, which is celebrating SBDC Day today, is based out of Penn State University in State College and helps provide counseling and training to small businesses to develop and provide informational tools to support business start-ups and existing business expansion. The SBDC locally assists businesses in Clinton, Centre, Lycoming and Mifflin counties.

According to Tim Keohane, director of the Penn State SBDC, helping people who want to start a business, or expand their current business, is very rewarding for the staff.

“A lot of times, the people that we work with may be planning or thinking about doing this for a long time. Some people refer to it as their dream to own a small business,” Keohane said. “We feel like we have the ability to be an important part of trying to make that happen.”

“While it’s not our business and we’re not part of the business, it becomes very rewarding for us to see the success in reaching that milestone,” he continued.

According to Keohane, statistics show that the SBDC program — which is part of the U.S. Small Business Administration — has made an impact across the nation in helping individuals start a business that succeeds.

“Through independent analysis… their chances increase significantly when they get help from a program like ours. If they were to go out and do this on their own, they’d likely run into a number of stumbling blocks and barriers they may not be able to navigate,” Keohane said.

According to the study of the program, Keohane said the general failure rate for someone starting a business is around 50 percent.

“The study of the SBDC program shows they have a roughly 35 percent chance or greater of success if they use the assistance,” he said.

Keohane said SBDC certainly can’t take all of the credit for business success in Clinton County and the others it serves.

“We’re not the only reason they’ve gotten to that point. But we do believe it feels good to know that those we’ve worked with particularly end up being around for a long time,” he said.

For those who have that dream business they’ve always wanted to start, Keohane encourages them to reach out to Penn State SBDC to learn more.

He explained the program, which was started back in 1980, restricts them to only assist a for-profit business.

“It would need to be a for-profit business, ideally located in one of our four counties — Clinton, Centre, Mifflin and Lycoming,” he said. “It’s a pretty easy process.”

Keohane said interested individuals can visit www.sbdc.psu.edu/ and click on the Consulting portion of the website.

“We have a link on our website that somebody can go to and request assistance to become a client through the Small Business Development Center. Then we match them up with one of our business consultants,” he said.

Keohane said it typically depends on where a business may be located and on what consultant could be offered. In Clinton County, it is often Tom Keiffer.

“But there may be a specialized type of business or assistance. Maybe it isn’t a start up but it’s an established business and they have needs in marketing,” Keohane explained, saying SBDC will work to find the right fit for a business.

“Once they sign up and do the registration it’s pretty straight forward. We get them matched up with a consultant and they go from there,” he said.

Those who would like to come prepared can do a number of things prior to meeting with a consultant at SBDC.

Keohane said the organization typically helps put together a business plan for an individual who is just getting their feet off the ground.

“Even if they don’t need that, we still highly encourage you to use a business plan,” he said. “Even if you’ve been in business for 5 to 10 years and decide to pivot in some way.”

He said the SBDC program is meant to assist a business, not do the footwork for them.

Some of the information that could be useful in preparing a business plan with SBDC is quotes from insurance agents, a variety of banking information in relation to loan programs.

“Doing some of that legwork before they come into us is helpful to make sure they have as much information as possible,” he said.

If you aren’t sure where to start, that’s okay too. Keohane said a consultant will often spend the first meeting providing “homework” or guidance on what information a potential business owner will want to pull together before digging into the plan.

For those who would like some extra guidance prior to meeting with a consultant, Keohane said the SBDC out of Penn State also offers monthly workshops: The First Steps for Starting a Small Business.

“That’s always, I think, a good thing for them to do before they sit down with a business consultant,” Keohane said. “That might end up taking the place of what a first meeting would include if they haven’t gotten that type of information that we present at the workshop.”

Keohane said the workshops take place the second Tuesday of each month in the morning. They offer two different formats each quarter, an in-person session and virtual.

Pre-registration is requested and may be done by visiting Penn State SBDC’s website.

With today as national SBDC Day, the Penn State-based program will be showcasing its impact in Clinton County on a big scale.

Community members across Centre, Clinton, Lycoming and Mifflin counties are invited to celebrate the power of small business during National SBDC Day on Tuesday, March 18, from 1-3 p.m. The event will be held at Nittany Valley Holistic Health — a multi-service, collaborative wellness space that supports both whole-person care and entrepreneurial growth.

Keohane said they chose Nittany Valley Holistic Health because many of the businesses within the space have utilized SBDC’s services.

“We have three clients that work out of that building. So really this annual celebration is to spotlight the successes of the clients. We really like to do an event each year where we can highlight an SBDC client, it just turns out this year we’ll be able to spotlight three,” he said.