Some Newark residents are now their own bosses after completing a training program to help them become small business owners.

Ruth Fombrun and her business partner Carron White are set to launch their online beauty company SAHSHÉ this spring. The two young Princeton University graduates say they have backgrounds in sales and research but needed help getting their business off the ground.   

 “We don’t have a lot of business expertise so there are quite a few gaps in knowledge. And another one of the big ones was not having our tech development in house, sort of outsourcing a lot of the work that needed to happen for our ecommerce business.” 

Both entrepreneurs are among 200 graduates from the Technical Assistance Program that helps minorities and women in each city ward expand or launch their own businesses. Brick City Development Corporation’s Lynier Richardson says many potential business owners ask him for three things. 

“Access to capital, contacts and contracts. So we focus on how to be bankable, how to be credit worthy, how to put together a business plan that people want to invest in.”

The second year program is scheduled to begin this summer.