Tom DuFore: 0:01

Welcome to the Multiply your Success podcast, where, each week, we help growth-minded entrepreneurs and franchise leaders take the next step in their expansion journey. I'm your host, tom Dufour, ceo of Big Sky Franchise Team, and, as we open today, I'm wondering, as a business leader, if you've ever considered securing grants as a way to generate additional income for your business, or maybe, if you're like me, you didn't even really know that that was an option for your specific type of business. Well, our guest today is Stormy Banks, and she's an expert at grant writing, and she shares with us how businesses of all shapes and sizes can secure grants for their company. Now, stormy is the founder and CEO of Pink Print Firm, which is a full-service grant writing agency dedicated to helping entrepreneurs secure funding. Under her leadership, her firm has obtained over $19 million in debt-free funding for small businesses across the United States.

Tom DuFore: 1:02

You're going to love this interview, so let's go ahead and jump right into it. One of the reasons I'm excited and enthused to have you on the show is really just to talk more about grant writing, and it's something that I think is pretty common, especially in the small business community, that most don't even think about grant writing as an opportunity for small businesses, and so I'd love maybe just to zoom out and just have you give us an overview of what grants are and how that all might work, just in general. So I'll start with what is a grant.

Stormi Banks: 1:35

Absolutely so. I like to tell people that grants are debt-free funding that you can use to scale and grow your business. You can do this by utilizing grants to create additional revenue streams in your business so that you can, of course, create more cashflow, which is the king in any business, for profit or nonprofit. Grants is usually something that's given out by the federal government or the state, or corporations or private foundations, and they're giving it out with some type of mission attached to it, whether it's to serve a particular industry, to serve a particular category of people or to serve just a particular revolutionary thing that they want to support in the world. So this is money that you can get through a competitive-based competition program and submitting applications either online or in person, which is very seldom that they're in person, but submitting an application and then hearing back about being an awardee.

Tom DuFore: 2:32

I'm sure for someone who ends up listening to this, the idea of debt-free financing probably catches the attention of a lot of entrepreneurs. I actually wrote it down when you were saying that how are they debt-free? What does that mean with this financing or funding?

Stormi Banks: 2:48

Absolutely so, through a grant opportunity. If they're calling it a grant, that means that they have no expectation of you to pay it back. So that is what entails the debt-free part. And, with that being said, there isn't any credit checks or any financial requirements that they're asking for. What they're requiring is that your mission aligns with what they're trying to do and that they're basically investing this money for you to do the outward work that they're looking to accomplish in the world. And, with that being said, it's important to note that grants are not tax free, so you still have tax implications, unless you, of course, know how to work your finances with your CPA and avoid some of that tax burden, but there's no requirement for you to pay the money back, so it's a really cool way to scale quickly and with more money than you probably had in your pocket to start with.

Tom DuFore: 3:40

Debt-free, not tax-free, tax implications still apply. Talk to your CPA or maybe professionals such as yourself who can help guide someone through that process. Let's talk about some of these different types of grants that might be available. I mean, people might think of maybe federal government or state government or something like that, but then you mentioned opportunities through other nonprofit organizations, other institutions. I'd never even known something like that might exist. So open up our eyes to what kinds of opportunities might exist out there, absolutely.

Stormi Banks: 4:15

Grants are so vast, you can find a grant for almost anything, and you can find them at different ranges on amounts, right. So you have grants or micro grants all the way from $500 to multimillion dollar grant projects. Now, of course, when you start getting to those bigger multimillions, there's more that needs to be established in terms of business and relationships that need to be built. But for a new business or a business owner that's a few years in their corporate grants are some of the easiest grants to get in terms of the application process. I'm talking about FedEx offers a grant every single year.

Stormi Banks: 4:50

You have corporations like HelloSkip, who's offering grant opportunities. They also have a grant database with tons of grants on there, which is HelloSkipcom. It's a great resource and website and you can be able to find grants consistently that you can apply for for your business. And then you have those foundation and private grant opportunities as well. Beyonce just hosted one through her foundation, and Megan Thee, stallion and Kevin Hart all their foundations are giving out grant opportunities to support whatever they are looking to serve. And so it's so vast and no matter where you're starting out in terms of time or finances in your business, you can get started with going for grants.

Tom DuFore: 5:29

That's an interesting point. So I guess what are some of the common myths, or maybe even misunderstandings, about grants?

Stormi Banks: 5:39

Absolutely. I think one of the biggest one is that, because we're so adapted to go for traditional funding in terms of loans or credit cards, we forget that the application process for grants is not a instant approval right. Grants can take you, you know, 30 days to 90 days for a corporate or a foundational grant to have cash in hand after application, depending on when you applied in the cycle of that grant, and so it's important to notice that grants is a sustainable funding strategy. This is something that you're utilizing to grow over time and that you're planning and preparing for, because sometimes, with grant programs, they do have implications where they want you to report or show what you use the money for. So it's not the free money notion that people might have heard before, because there still are implications when it comes to getting the grant funding, but in terms of just how it works in you know other myths that are out there.

Stormi Banks: 6:32

A lot of people think that their business isn't eligible or they're not qualified. We hear that all the time. Like, am I qualified? And I try to tell business. If you have the basics a business website, social media, business bank account or registered business you can start applying to grants today.

Tom DuFore: 6:47

That is fascinating. I would think the same thing. I mean, what would a business such as ours? I mean, we're in our 10th year of operation now and you know you start thinking about those kinds of things like, well, aren't those usually for a startup business? You know someone that's brand new and starting, and when I see opportunities it seems like something in that regard.

Stormi Banks: 7:07

That's good to know and I think it's important to understand that the different types of grants will really resonate with different type of businesses. So, for instance, some of those corporate grants and loss sheets just because they haven't gotten there. So it's important during your different stages of business that you're going for different types of grants to really make sure you're going to be successful in your grant writing process.

Tom DuFore: 7:45

One thing that stood out was talking about grants and grant opportunities for franchising. We work with entrepreneurs and help them franchise their business. One of the big pain points for most franchise systems is helping get funding for franchisees. So I'd love for you just to talk about how you've seen grants apply to the franchise community.

Stormi Banks: 8:07

Absolutely. I've seen recently and partnered recently as we're franchising Pinkprint currently, right now that we offered a joint partnership grant with Black Box Franchising who was able to help people get that initial cost for their franchisees and also the franchisor costs, kind of absorb some of those legal fees and creating all those documentations and processes. It's really important, and there's grant opportunities that are available, to be able to scale with a franchise, you know business model.

Tom DuFore: 8:40

If someone's interested, they say, wow, this is really cool, I like what you're doing or I want to learn some more about it. How can someone get in touch with you, reach out, connect.

Stormi Banks: 8:49

Yeah, I mean our email is our primary form of communication, so we just are at info at pinkprintnet. But of course you can follow us on any socials at Pinkprint Firm and you can DM us and we do DM back.

Tom DuFore: 9:02

Perfect. We'll make sure we include that in the show notes here. This great time in the show we ask every guest the same four questions before they go. And the first question we ask is have you had a miss or two on your journey and something you learned from it?

Stormi Banks: 9:14

I've had tons of misses when I really sit and think about it.

Stormi Banks: 9:17

One that stood out to me a lot while we were talking pre-show is I begged my mom for about a year to take piano lessons, and this is when I was probably still in elementary school at some point.

Stormi Banks: 9:30

Begged her to take piano lessons. She saved up the money, you know, got me the piano, all the stuff that I needed to be able to take the lesson successfully, and it was harder than I thought it was going to be. And probably a month in I begged her to quit and she let me, she let me quit and she said okay, if you don't want to go, I'm not going to force you to go, but I wish that I wouldn't have quit because it took me a really long time in my adulthood to adapt discipline. I didn't get that skill set as a child because I was like able to quit stuff, and as an adult it cost me a lot of things, a lot of you know the body, the dream body that I could have had, the dream bank account that I could have had earlier on, and I had to adapt that through a lot of trial and error methods, and so I would say that that was probably a miss that I wish I would have stuck with, so that I could have learned discipline way earlier on.

Tom DuFore: 10:23

We are in the midst with our children. One is requesting to no longer take piano, so this is timely for me to start thinking. Okay, I think I'm going to take Stormy's advice here. I like this. Well, let's talk about a highlight or a make, a win to share.

Stormi Banks: 10:39

I remember the first client that we got funding for through grant applications and this was when we were we weren't even really an agency. At this time we were kind of like beta testing. We were like, just pay me $50, you know, to do this thing, and we got her the funding. That moment I had full faith in the capabilities of what the company could do, because it was like, oh, this works, like the strategy we use actually works. Let's see if it works again and again and again. And at that point that's what made me believe like we're doing good work, the work is worth it and we're going to go full force with this thing.

Tom DuFore: 11:15

Well, the name of the show is Multiply your Success, and so we always ask have you used a multiplier to grow yourself, personally, professionally, or any organizations you've run?

Stormi Banks: 11:26

Yeah, I think my multiplier is honestly going to be I read four books a month. I'm an audible person and so I literally will listen to a book and, you know, download it, write my notes, get the information. Because I think that constant education, no matter what level of budget you have, if you can continuously be taking in new ideas, new processes, new philosophies and trying them out, executing on them daily, daily, just to see if they work for you, that has been something that has propelled me so far, because I'm not leaning on my own understanding to get new skill sets or learn new things.

Tom DuFore: 12:01

Yeah, I love that. The continuous education and four books a month, that's a lot. There's about 50 books a year. That's impressive. I love it. The final question we ask every guest is what does success mean to you?

Stormi Banks: 12:13

Honestly, if I was going to measure it, it's probably in a calendar year. How many times did I show up for the things that my family has going on? I have five siblings and so there's a lot of them, and they're all over there in New York or they're in Memphis, tennessee, and you know where's he? At Chicago. So it's it's. It's a lot of work to make that happen, with me living in Atlanta, georgia, but I think at the end of the year, if I can say OK, I made it to his graduation, his birthday, her bachelorette, his wedding, and I feel like that's the accomplishment for me, to be like I had a successful year.

Tom DuFore: 12:47

And Stormy, before we go and bring this to a close, is there anything you were hoping to share or get across that you haven't had a chance to yet?

Stormi Banks: 13:12

the big remark it would be that trying is cool. It's fearful to try something new and possibly fail at it, but it's the cool thing to do because you learn so much and gain so much skill set through the process.

Tom DuFore: 13:19

I'm kind of circling back to a comment you had made earlier about applying for a traditional loan. I mean, most of the time it's a lot of work and effort and very often it's not an overnight process, so there's a whole rigmarole that goes along with that, and what you're proposing sounds like may not be all that different, or maybe potentially less work in some cases to see if you can get this debt-free financing as you described it. I really like that. It really makes it easier to understand what's involved with that and working with someone like you to help guide them through that, I really appreciate you sharing this and bringing this to the attention of our listeners here.

Stormi Banks: 14:00

My pleasure. Thanks for having me, Tom.

Tom DuFore: 14:04

Stormy, thank you so much for a fantastic interview and let's go ahead and jump into today's three key takeaways. So takeaway number one is when Stormy talked about the definition of a grant and I thought that the way she described it was excellent where a grant is another way to grow cash flow, especially for a small business, and she said they are offered by state and federal governments, corporations and private foundations and she described it as debt-free financing. Takeaway number two is this how can it be debt-free financing? Well, she said that with the grant, it means that there is no expectation to pay it back, and she said it's not tax-free but there's no payback required and generally you're able to secure the grant because you or your business or there's some common match of some kind between the funding that's available through the government or through the purpose or intent of the foundation or the corporate, give back. That might be happening there.

Tom DuFore: 15:14

Takeaway number three is a miss that she said she had which was not really learning discipline as a child, and she gave that focus or that example of piano lessons when she was able to quit piano lessons midstream, and she said that because she was able to start and stop things, she didn't learn that personal discipline and had to learn that as an adult.

Tom DuFore: 15:40

And now it's time for today's win-win. So today's win-win is when Stormy talked about grants being for all types of businesses at any stage and any age, and I thought that was a really great takeaway. Grants are not just for startups, which I had really thought that that probably would be the indication that it's more for a startup company, but it's not the case. There's a wide variety of grants that are available for all types of businesses and all types of industries, and so that's the episode today. Folks, Please make sure you subscribe to the podcast and give us a review, and remember if you or anyone you know might be ready to franchise their business or take their franchise company to the next level. Please connect with us at BigSkyFranchiseTeamcom. Thanks for tuning in and we look forward to having you back next week.