E31: Janice Shade: How Community Capital Moves Money from Wall Street to Main Street

Community capital, crowdfunding, and local investing take center stage in this episode of Fortunes of the Brave. Systems entrepreneur and financial innovator Janice Shade, co-founder of Milk Money Vermont and founder of Capital Innovation Lab and Fundamenta, joins host Lance Woodson to unpack how everyday people can invest in the small businesses that define their hometowns. From her early days at Seventh Generation questioning the “green premium” to designing new models for Main Street investing, Janice shows why traditional capital markets leave most founders and communities behind.

She shares the moment an attorney chuckled at her “million moms” funding idea and how that dismissal pushed her to pioneer legal, practical paths for citizen investors long before crowdfunding was a buzzword. You’ll hear the inside story of Milk Money Vermont, including the maple syrup startup whose founder burst into tears when a complete stranger invested in her business online. Janice explains why most successful equity crowdfunding campaigns still rely heavily on founders’ own networks, and why investor education is the missing link to scaling community capital.

Janice and Lance dig into why small business funding is so hard, what keeps women and underrepresented founders from seeking capital, and how tools like her Money Map help entrepreneurs choose the right pathway instead of defaulting to banks or “finding a sugar daddy” investor. They wrestle with the tension between making money and making meaning, asking how much is enough and what true community wealth looks like when investors and founders sit on the same side of the table.

If you care about impact investing, local economies, or finally moving your portfolio off Wall Street and into Main Street, this conversation is a masterclass in what’s possible right now, and what still needs to change. Listen to this episode of Fortunes of the Brave to see how your money can start serving your community, not the other way around.

Key Takeaways:

• Challenge the assumption that banks and venture capital are the only viable sources of small business funding.
• Discover how intrastate crowdfunding and state-level regulations opened the door for local investing.
• Learn why most crowdfunding campaigns still raise 90–95% of capital from the founder’s own warm market.
• Understand how financial literacy and “Money Map” thinking can give entrepreneurs real power at the capital table.
• Reimagine wealth as a shared community outcome, not just an individual net-worth number.

Chapters:
00:00 – Why this conversation on community capital matters now
01:38 – From Seventh Generation to questioning the “green premium”
03:57 – Getting laughed at and inventing new paths to capital
06:51 – Ben & Jerry’s, intrastate crowdfunding, and Vermont’s law change
09:43 – Milk Money Vermont and “neighbors investing in neighbors”
14:30 – Why crowdfunding is still harder than it should be
17:50 – Moving money off Wall Street and onto Main Street
23:09 – The Money Map: redesigning the entrepreneur’s capital journey
25:55 – Women founders, fear of finance, and under-capitalized communities
28:30 – Nonprofit fundraising fatigue and the leap to Fundamenta
31:53 – Redefining wealth, enoughness, and community outcomes
36:21 – New tools for finance: beyond the master’s house and tools
38:08 – CDFIs, local loan funds, and cities as funding engines
44:16 – Starting your first company at 42 with two kids
46:11 – Closing thoughts and Fortunes of the Brave CTA

Resources Mentioned:

• Milk Money Vermont
• Capital Innovation Lab
• Fundamenta (community capital platform)
• Vermont Evaporator Company
• Vermont Community Loan Fund (CDFI)
• Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs)
• Seventh Generation
• Ben & Jerry’s early intrastate offering
• JOBS Act and early Regulation Crowdfunding
• “Moving Money” (book mentioned in the episode)

Connect with Janice:
Website: https://www.janiceshade.com
LinkedIn
Other: Capital Innovation Lab – https://innovatecapital.org

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