About

Northbound Ventures Consulting, LLC was established in September 2013 by co-founders Holly Fowler and Scott Richardson. We are a small consulting firm based in Montpelier, Vermont, where our work revolves around food systems, outdoor recreation, and community economic revitalization.

Mission

Our mission is to assist strategic change initiatives and inform development decisions aimed at improving social wellness and creating opportunity for economic prosperity.

Services

Our core services include in-person and remote facilitation, strategic planning, social enterprise and network development, business management consulting, community engagement, research design, data analysis, and impact evaluation. Typical project deliverables include field-building, market analyses, feasibility studies, business plans, financial scenario models, food system and food program assessments.

Our Clients

We work with organizations, municipalities, state and federal government, food policy councils, regional planning commissions, economic development agencies (e.g., CDCs, CDFIs) and foundations.

Our clients often have ambitious goals to improve health and economic outcomes for under resourced populations in urban and rural areas. We are accustomed to working in places with deep and myriad challenges (e.g., main street real estate vacancies, lack of affordable housing, limited industry and jobs, population migrations and decline, brownfields, natural disaster damage, generational poverty) and likewise with multiple stakeholder groups holding different agendas. Northbound routinely supports communities nationwide to develop community action plans that allow them to focus development goals and attract resources to fulfill them. 

Below is a list of communities, regions and states with which we have worked since 2013, many of them through the U.S. EPA Local Foods, Local Places and Recreation Economy for Rural Communities technical assistance programs. Each community project represents collaboration with many cross-sector partners.

Where we’ve worked…

  • Columbiana, Alabama

  • Fayette, Alabama

  • Anchorage, Alaska

  • Sacramento, California

  • State of Colorado

  • Bridgeport, Connecticut

  • East St. Louis, Illinois

  • Peoria, Illinois

  • Springfield, Illinois

  • Evansville, Indiana

  • Gary, Indiana

  • Indianapolis, Indiana

  • Louisville, Kentucky

  • Frankfort, Kentucky

  • Biddeford, Maine

  • Freeport, Maine

  • Lewiston-Auburn, Maine

  • Anne Arundel County, Maryland

  • Baltimore, Maryland

  • Boston, Massachusetts

  • Chelsea, Massachusetts

  • Holyoke, Massachusetts

  • Lawrence, Massachusetts

  • Lowell, Massachusetts

  • New Bedford, Massachusetts 

  • Pepperell, Massachusetts

  • Pittsfield, Massachusetts

  • Somerville, Massachusetts

  • Springfield, Massachusetts

  • Detroit, Michigan

  • Pelican Rapids, Minnesota

  • Saint Paul, Minnesota

  • Kansas City, Missouri

  • Gorham, New Hampshire

  • Haverhill, New Hampshire

  • Las Vegas, Nevada

  • Grants, New Mexico

  • Cortland, New York

  • Malone, New York

  • Poughkeepsie, New York

  • Saratoga Springs, New York

  • Beverly, Ohio

  • Coshocton, Ohio

  • Lawrence County, Ohio

  • Tulsa, Oklahoma

  • Wyandotte Nation, Oklahoma

  • Cottage Grove, Oregon

  • John Day, Oregon

  • Aliquippa, Pennsylvania

  • Erie, Pennsylvania

  • Indiana, Pennsylvania

  • Johnstown, Pennsylvania

  • State of Rhode Island

  • Woonsocket, Rhode Island

  • Addison County, Vermont

  • Marshfield, Vermont

  • State of Vermont

  • Martinsville, Virginia

  • Northern Neck, Virginia

  • Unincorporated King County, Washington

  • Charleston, West Virginia

  • Charles Town, West Virginia