{"id":36633,"date":"2026-06-12T14:19:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T19:19:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/?post_type=tribe_events&p=36633"},"modified":"2026-06-15T15:44:47","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T20:44:47","slug":"grant-funding-for-small-businesses-how-to-find-and-win-free-capital","status":"publish","type":"tribe_events","link":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/event\/grant-funding-for-small-businesses-how-to-find-and-win-free-capital\/","title":{"rendered":"Grant Funding for Small Businesses: How to Find and Win Free Capital"},"content":{"rendered":"

Securing capital is one of the biggest hurdles for any entrepreneur, but you don’t always have to trade equity or take on debt to grow. This session breaks down the grant landscape in clear, practical terms, helping owners understand the difference between federal, state, and private funding sources, what reviewers actually look for in a winning application, and how to avoid the most common pitfalls. Attendees get a live demo of the FundingTrail Grant Database and learn how to build a repeatable search and submission system that fits into a real schedule. It is ideal for both early-stage founders and established business owners who want to move from searching to actually applying.<\/p>\n

Featured Speaker<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sam Shanley is the founder of FundingTrail, a platform he built to help fellow entrepreneurs skip the headache of searching for business grants.\u00a0Sam\u2019s perspective on small business comes from both sides of the table; he spent six years as a VC at Adams Street Partners before moving into the trenches to build, run, and eventually sell his own hospitality business, Off Map Glamping. Having experienced the highs and lows of the “founder life” for four years,\u00a0Sam\u00a0is doing his best to make capital more accessible to small business owners. When he isn\u2019t working on FundingTrail, he volunteers as a mentor with SCORE Chicago, helping entrepreneurs navigate the\u00a0same hurdles he faced. He\u2019s here to share the tools and shortcuts he wishes he\u2019d had when he started out.<\/span><\/p>\n

Part of The Source X WBDC Series\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Securing capital is one of the biggest hurdles for any entrepreneur, but you don’t always have to trade equity or take on debt to grow. This session breaks down the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":36332,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"_tribe_events_status":"","_tribe_events_status_reason":"","_tribe_events_is_hybrid":"","_tribe_events_is_virtual":"","_tribe_events_virtual_video_source":"","_tribe_events_virtual_embed_video":"","_tribe_events_virtual_linked_button_text":"","_tribe_events_virtual_linked_button":"","_tribe_events_virtual_show_embed_at":"","_tribe_events_virtual_show_embed_to":[],"_tribe_events_virtual_show_on_event":"","_tribe_events_virtual_show_on_views":"","_tribe_events_virtual_url":"","footnotes":"","_tec_slr_enabled":"","_tec_slr_layout":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"tags":[],"tribe_events_cat":[88],"class_list":["post-36633","tribe_events","type-tribe_events","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tribe_events_cat-access-to-capital","cat_access-to-capital"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"ticketed":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tribe_events\/36633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tribe_events"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/tribe_events"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tribe_events\/36633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36634,"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tribe_events\/36633\/revisions\/36634"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36633"},{"taxonomy":"tribe_events_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wbdc.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tribe_events_cat?post=36633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}