DETROIT – JPMorgan Chase is doubling down on its investment in Detroit, pumping millions of dollars more into the city after handing over $150 million previously.
Cynt-Sational Popcorn is just one of the many businesses spawned from the small business investment JPMorgan Chase is funding.
CEO Jamie Dimon rolled out his original Detroit investment on the "Today" Show five years and $100 million ago.
In 2017, he added $50 million. He said he is so impressed with the progress that he added another $50 million.
The QLine got some of the first chunk of cash. Dimon himself broke ground for the Capitol Lofts.
Small businesses such as the House of Pure Vin exist thanks the to JPMorgan Chase money.
The cash has had a major affect at the Detroit Kitchen Connect. Inside Eastern Market's Shed 5, Cynthia Davis manufactured her Cynt-Sational Popcorn.
"Today, we're making sexy firecracker," Davis said.
She, her late husband and their three sons started in the family kitchen. They needed a licensed commercial kitchen to get into stores and discovered the Detroit Kitchen Connect, renting twice a week.
Now, they sell 50 pounds of popcorn per week.
"An idea was making healthy popcorn for our community, and then it was the entire state of Michigan, so we've done that," Davis said. "Now we're in all seven Whole Foods locations. The next stop is to get our own brick and mortar."
Anika Summers runs the Eastern Market partnership overseeing the kitchen. She said without JPMorgan Chase putting $5 million into Shed 5 or backing business development, none of it would be possible.
"We could not have dreamed of the success we've had and the ripple effect that it has made within our community and what it has meant for the jobs it has created," Summers said.
The kitchen stays busy all week. So far, workers believe they've launched 30 commercial food businesses over the last five years. They said only one has defaulted.
Click here to learn how to start a food business in Eastern Market.