Kingsburg is semi-finalist in a web contest to win $500,000

The city of Kingsburg is a national semi-finalist in an online web series that could net the community $500,000.

The series, “Small Business Revolution,” stars Robert Herjavec from “Shark Tank” and Deluxe Corporation’s Amanda Brinkman. The series’ goal is to kick-start a small town’s revival by sharing $500,000 among six of its small businesses.

Kingsburg is one of eight semi-finalists out of 14,000 nominations.

City manager Alex Henderson submitted Kingsburg’s nomination, saying he saw an opportunity to share the city’s strong family values, agricultural economy, community togetherness and Swedish heritage.

“My thought was that it would be an excellent way to promote the entire area while helping our downtown businesses as well,” he said.

The eight semi-finalists were chosen based on several factors. including the willingness of each community to support the transformation of its businesses.

The Deluxe team will visit each semi-finalist and then narrow the list down to a group of finalists. The public will vote for the winner.

The review panel will visit Kingsburg in December. Voting for a winning city will take place online from Feb. 9 through Feb. 16 at SmallBusinessRevolution.org. The winner will be announced on Feb. 22. The winning city will be featured in multiple episodes of the web series in the second season of “Small Business Revolution.”

This story was originally published November 25, 2016 at 4:45 PM with the headline "Kingsburg is semi-finalist in a web contest to win $500,000."