Scaling without breaking everything
She stayed. Rebranded. Rebuilt.
Now Frankie’s is a scratch-made restaurant and listening room that doubles as the town’s gathering spot. Events went from six in 2024 to twelve in 2025. Off-site catering jumped from one gig to four. She just pulled off a 24-foot grazing table for 250 guests, which sounds impressive until you realize she did it without proper storage, without enough staff, without the infrastructure most catering operations take for granted.
Her $14,500 Kiva loan pays for the rebrand, organized storage for event gear, and upgrades that let her grow without constantly improvising. It also means hiring more staff so she can keep people employed through Sisters’ brutal seasonal dips when tourism dies and half the town goes quiet.
Eryn co-founded the Sisters Business Association because she knows other entrepreneurs are fighting the same battles: how to scale when you’re in a small market, how to keep employees year-round when your revenue swings wildly with the seasons, how to build something sustainable when the infrastructure most businesses rely on just doesn’t exist out here.
When businesses like hers succeed, the whole town benefits. Her father got her into hospitality, always talking about food, always believing in the power of gathering people around a table.
What the numbers actually tell you
Since Kiva Oregon launched in February 2024, we’ve endorsed 164 loans totaling $511,500. Completely crowdfunded capital from people worldwide who believe character matters more than credit scores.
236 entrepreneurs have explored the program. Our repayment rate sits at 89.4%, well above what traditional microfinance typically sees.
82.6% of our borrowers are rural-based. Fifteen CO.STARTERS graduates have secured loans, proving that training plus capital access actually changes outcomes instead of just sounding good in a grant proposal.
And this matters: 76% of Kiva U.S. borrowers couldn’t find money anywhere else.
