I wrote my first for-profit grant in 1987 and from there I would write no more than a few a year
because most businesses didn’t qualify.
For years, I felt like the person standing on the corner with a large poster board that read “Get
Ready, It’s Coming.” While federal grants for companies, like S-Corps, LLC’s, and C-Corps, has
existed since the mid-1960s, the majority of funding came from a handful of agencies and mostly
focused on research and development. This research focus became really popular in the 1980s
when scientist and pharmaceutical companies were racing to create a cure for HIV/AIDS.
Today, there are about two dozen federal agencies offering grants to small businesses and large
businesses. Grants are exactly what you think they are. Free money that does not get paid back
to perform services, develop new innovations, research ways to overcome social challenges and
more. Small businesses are defined as for-profits with fewer than 500 employees. Large
businesses, titled as For-Profit Businesses by the federal government, are companies with more
than 500 employees.
Does Every Business Qualify?
No, every business does not qualify but eligibility has nothing to do with the type of business
structure. It is based on other qualifiers like geography, industry, and service models. Like
grants for nonprofit organizations, federal grants to for-profit businesses are designed to solve or
support a social challenge. The good news is that defining what is considered a social challenge
is broad and can be met by everything from solving environmental dilemmas to create equitable
access to services for disadvantaged communities to providing a technology tool to expedite
health outcomes and address disparities.
Technology innovation is leading the pack on what the federal government is looking to fund,
followed by manufacturing, workforce development, and believe it or not – management
consulting too.
Differences to Federal Contracting
First, it is a different stream of money yet still in billions of dollars available. The playing field
is a lot more fair and balanced because meeting the guidelines is the most important step vs. so
being heavily relationship driven. Packaging is a major component in creating a pathway to
success for companies looking to use federal grant funds to grow the company. Also, the goal is
to help business scale while meeting a need in our communities.
Ready to Discover More?
Take the first step in determining if your business qualifies for federal grant funding by
completing our questionnaire HERE.
US News Reports on a Partial List of Funding
Check out the link to access a recent article confirming that federal grants are real Here
By Denise B. Lawrence
President
For Profit Grants