Daily Q&A: How much government funding can my small business get?

Today’s question of the day is: How much government funding can my small business get?

To help you answer that question we reached out to our in house funding expert who deals not only with government funding, but private funding as well for all types and sizes of businesses all across Canada.

The amount of government funding that you may be able to get from the Canadian government really depends on a number of factors. These factors range from province to province, from industry to industry and based on your needs. What I mean by that is that no business is alike, and no “government funding request” is alike. The fact is that if you were to place five of the exact same businesses in one room (from the same province, from the same industry and with the same “funding need”), their requests for funding would still be different.

Why?

Let’s say that you are looking to get a government grant or a government loan to help you purchase equipment for your business. This equipment can be items such as a machine to get your work done, a computer, a desk, papers/pens/notebooks, vehicles, vacuum cleaners…etc, the list is never ending. But for this example let’s say you are a cleaning business and you need to purchase a van for your work, as well as some equipment to help you professionally clean floors. One entrepreneur may contact one funding agency, another person may contact another. This is the first difference, considering that there are over 900 government grant and loan programs offered by the Canadian government. The other difference is that one entrepreneur is looking to purchase a Toyota Van, while another one want’s a very specific Mercedes Van. The price difference is obvious.

So how much can you really get?

Different funding agencies provide different amounts. They all have their minimums and maximums, so your real concern shouldn’t be how much you can get, but instead it should be who do I contact, and how much do I really need. If a government funding programs offers funding of up to $500,000, do you really want to ask for that? Can you use is (probably), but would you be able to get it? Probably not.

Your goal is to figure out how much you exactly need and provide the government agency, or multiple agencies with a total, or partial numbers of how much you need.One thing to keep in mind is that your credit score, your business plan and your actual funding need all play important roles in the funding amount of government funding.

In our experience here at CanadaStartups, we have seen small business owners obtain funding as little as $1,500 (for training one employee), to $22 million for a rural farmer. So it really depends on the funding program, the deadlines, your location, industry, funding need, your business plan, your credit score and how you ask for it!

As you can see there is no actual figure that you could be provided with, however the feedback we receive from our expert funding adviser is to look at the details and apply accordingly.

Tune in tomorrow for another one of our Daily Q&A’s about small business startups, business plans, funding and everything else.

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