Equity
in Care

Chicago, IL — As May marks both National Small Business Month and Mental Health Awareness Month, a new collaboration between Break Bread Chicago and DishRoulette Kitchen is launching a citywide effort to better understand and support the mental health of Chicago's small business owners during a period of growing economic and social instability.

The initiative, Equity in Care: Integrating Mental Health Equity into Chicago's Entrepreneur Ecosystem, is a participatory research project that positions mental health as essential infrastructure within the city's small business landscape. While traditional entrepreneur support systems prioritize capital, compliance, and technical assistance, they often exclude mental health access despite its critical role in long-term economic resilience.

Led by Chris Cole, Founder of Break Bread Chicago, the initiative will conduct an equity-centered Entrepreneurial Mental Health Needs Assessment, engaging business owners across industries through surveys and compensated focus groups. The project is designed to surface how stress, burnout, and systemic barriers impact entrepreneurs, particularly Black, Latine, immigrant, and historically marginalized business owners.

The project emerged from Chris Cole's work as a 2025 Fellow with Chicago United for Equity (CUE), where he explored the intersection of racial equity, economic development, and mental health within Chicago's entrepreneurial ecosystem. Through the fellowship, the project was shaped by a broader commitment to advancing equitable systems change and addressing how structural inequities impact both community wellbeing and economic opportunity.

The timing of the initiative reflects an increasingly urgent reality for Chicago's entrepreneurs. Black and Latine small business communities are facing a perfect storm of policy-driven disruption. From erratic tariffs that can spike input and operating costs overnight to aggressive immigration enforcement that destabilizes neighborhoods, reduces foot traffic, silences workers, and creates widespread fear, many entrepreneurs are navigating conditions that extend far beyond the normal pressures of running a business.

These challenges are producing layered and compounding impacts on both economic stability and mental wellbeing. Business owners are not only confronting financial uncertainty and operational strain, but also the long-term psychological effects of chronic stress, fear, trauma, burnout, and instability affecting families, employees, and entire commercial corridors. Equity in Care seeks to better understand these realities and build responses grounded in community voice and lived experience.

“Entrepreneurs are carrying far more than the responsibility of keeping their businesses afloat. Many Black and Latine business owners are operating under constant uncertainty as policy decisions, economic volatility, and immigration enforcement reshape the environments they depend on to survive. We are only beginning to understand the long-term emotional, psychological, and economic impacts this sustained pressure is having on entrepreneurs, workers, and communities. Equity in Care is about recognizing mental health as economic infrastructure and building systems that respond with equity, dignity, and care.”

— Chris Cole, Founder of Break Bread Chicago

The project is funded and supported by the Chicago Community Foundation at the recommendation of Builders Vision. DishRoulette Kitchen will serve as a supporter and fiscal sponsor, helping provide operational support, community engagement infrastructure, and distribution of findings across its network of more than 3,000+ entrepreneurs.

“Too often, economic development conversations measure success through revenue, growth, or investment while overlooking the human cost of sustaining a business in inequitable systems. Our entrepreneurs are navigating economic instability, policy shifts, fear, and trauma in real time. This initiative challenges the ecosystem to move beyond transactional support and invest in the long-term wellbeing and resilience of the people driving our local economy.”

— Chris Cole, Founder of Break Bread

The project is currently in the data collection phase, with a needs assessment actively gathering insights from small business owners across Chicago. The next phase will translate findings into implementation through compensated focus groups centering the lived experiences of BIPOC entrepreneurs. Participants will be resourced for their time and expertise to ensure equitable engagement and deeper qualitative insight. Findings will inform culturally responsive mental health supports, including strategic partnerships with providers, group-based care models, ecosystem policy recommendations, and integration of mental health navigation into existing and new support models.

Chicago small business owners are encouraged to participate in the needs assessment and share it with entrepreneurs across their networks to help expand community insight and strengthen the data informing this work. Community members should also be on the lookout for upcoming paid, in-person focus groups taking place this summer as another opportunity to share their experiences and perspectives. Equity in Care is actively seeking collaboration and support across sectors, including mental health providers, philanthropic partners, researchers, advocates, policymakers, and organizations working in economic development and community care. Those interested in supporting or partnering on this work are encouraged to contact Chris Cole at chris@teamhilo.org.