How to Get a Grant or Loan to Open a Bar
Being the owner of a bar can sound like a cool job to have but unfortunately, not many people are aware of how much it actually costs to do that. Opening a bar is an expensive endeavor for which you will be required to have quite a large sum of money. Besides the initial expenses, there will be a lot of other costs to take care of like hiring and paying your staff, buying or renting a space, and taking care of inventory items.
Seeking out investors can be a good idea if you’re thinking of opening a bar. In fact, this is one of the most popular ways in which people accomplish this. You can also seek out funding through small business loans or grants. This is the topic that we will be covering in this article. Here we go!
Begin with a solid business plan
You should never adventure yourself into opening any type of business without first having a solid business plan. This will act as the base of your entire activity. It should include all the necessary costs of opening and maintaining a successful business. You should make sure that you consider everything when coming up with a plan.
Think of how much you would be willing to pay for a space or its rent. Consider all the expenses concerning the licenses for the liquor that you’re going to sell along with the staff salary expenses and maintenance costs. You might also want to renovate your location which can be rather costly too.
This business plan for your bar will represent the blueprint of your progress and the starting point that will help you decide on a funding option.
How to get a grant to open a bar
The first step that you should take when it comes to finding funding for your bar is to search for grants online. Search for these opportunities around the area where you want to open the business. The official website of your state can be a good starting point when searching for bar owner grants.
Apart from this, the online government grants database can provide lots of opportunities too. By searching on the official government website, you will definitely find some listings containing bar grants around your area.
Once you’ve found the perfect grant for you, just fill out the application form with the required details. There are a lot of things that you can add to make your application stand out from the rest. You can talk about the employment impact of your business in that specific area and about the tax benefits of your future business, among other things. A good idea would be not to necessarily open a bat close to home but rather in an area without too many such businesses. This will certainly strengthen your chances of being accepted for a grant.
How to obtain a loan for a bar
If you think of applying for a loan for your bar, then you should first check out the Small Business Administration website and apply for one there. There is no guarantee that you will be accepted, especially if you don’t have any experience, but it doesn’t hurt to try.
Then you have the classic solution of applying for a small business loan from a bank or a union. You will need your business plan here too, so make sure to have one that details all the costs of opening this business. The plan should also include your expected revenue. You may need to co-sign the application or ask someone else to be a co-signer. This might drastically increase your chances of being accepted for the loan.
Last but not least, if none of the aforementioned solutions seem favorable to you, you can pick an online lender for a small business loan. There are multiple choices to pick from but make sure to do some research beforehand and go for a lender that is trustworthy and experienced. This option is also preferable if your credit score is not that good and a loan from a bank wouldn’t be possible.
Just fill out the application form on the official website of the chosen lender with all the required details about your business and some personal details too. Connect a bank account so that the funds can be sent to you once you’ve been accepted for a loan. Funding is usually extremely fast with online lenders and you might get your money in as little as 24 hours. The lender also needs a bank account so it can withdraw the regular payments when the time comes without you needing to do anything.
Make sure to verify all the loan details thoroughly and see what are their repayment terms, the maximum and minimum amounts that you can borrow, and their APY rates. It’s also worth noting that usually, the eligibility requirements to be accepted for a loan from an online lender are not very strict at all.
It’s much easier to take out a small business loan from such a lender than it is from a bank. It is also quicker and without any extra fees to be paid. This happens because a lender does everything online and, usually, doesn’t have a physical branch that needs to be maintained through fees from clients.
Conclusion
In conclusion, getting a grant or a small business loan to open a bar is a necessary step if you want to begin your activity correctly. As we have seen, there are a lot of options to pick from, especially when it comes to loans. However, it’s mandatory to have a strong business plan before applying for any loan or grant. Besides that, thoroughly checking all the details of a lender and making sure that everything is safe is extremely important too. You should never let yourself be carried away by a seemingly advantageous loan without first verifying its credibility from multiple sources. You can even read reviews or ask around to see if your friends or relatives have dealt with a certain lender in the past.