Event highlights how investing locally can build wealth in Denver area neighborhoods

Entrepreneurship has always been a path to success in this country.

A food tasting event at the National Western Events Center on Wednesday focused on helping small food businesses connect to big opportunities.

The Center for Community Wealth Building invited representatives from "anchor institutions" such as cities, colleges, hospitals and museums to taste samples and get to know local food vendors.

The goal is to build relationships and trust so large contracts can help support local business as well as local hiring and investment.

CBS Colorado caught up with one food entrepreneur already reaping the rewards of this approach.

Alejandro Flores Muñoz, the owner of Combi Café and Stokes Poke Catering, loves sharing the delicious flavors of real Mexican street food. He's always cooking up ingredients for tacos he is confident people will crave. And increasingly, Flores Muñoz and his team are cooking for larger and larger crowds. And signing six figure catering contracts.

"I aspire to be able to showcase that entrepreneurship is a viable option for folks to build generational wealth in this country," he said.

Flores Muñoz now guides other small business owners on TikTok.

He credits connections he's made to contracts with institutions like Meow Wolf or the City of Denver.

And the guidance he's received from the Center for Community Wealth Building.

"I don't have to just rely on my food truck, that there are institutions that have events, meetings, galas all the time, and why not us be the caterers for those events rather than the big corporations we all know of?" said Flores Muñoz.

Yessica Holguín founded the center and she's spent the last several years working to convince large institutions around Denver to break the mold by giving minority businesses a chance.

"This is not about charity," Holguín said. "This is about doing business, and just doing business in a different way that actually focuses on our local businesses and ensuring that we're supporting them."

For Holguín, the greatest satisfaction is seeing business people like Flores Muñoz's win bigger contracts, hire new staff, or acquire property.

"I think all of these institutions have our community's well-being in mind. It's just, how do we align that sense of mission with the business operations," she said.

Holguín says the talent is here. When business people like Flores Muñoz are given a shot, magic happens.

And she hopes, the local community starts to build wealth.

"Having wealth is not just me having money. It means having time to spend with your kids. It means being able to grow up in a community that is working for everyone," said Flores Muñoz.

And he adds -- it compels in him the desire to engage in the community and pay it forward.

To learn more about the Center for Community Wealth Building, visit communitywealthbuilding.org.