SBA report shows need for women-owned business finances in expansion

All business owners need to look in the right places for funding, but women in this field may have an especially high need – one that government loan programs may be able to fill. In an Issue Brief dated May 31, the Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy used information from a 2012 survey to dissect funding trends for different entrepreneurs. One of the many interesting measures was the graph of expansion funding and the varying ways that male and female-owned businesses approach securing capital.

In a broad sense, the general patterns are the same for both genders. Personal and family savings were the dominant source of funding for start-up financing for male and female-owned businesses: both demographics had more than 60 percent of businesses in this category. The majority of both of these types of businesses also did not see expansions in 2012. However, more women-owned businesses were reliant on personal funding and didn’t expand, either.

For women business owners, this could show an important gap, considering the amount of businesses currently existing. The National Association of Women Business Owners’ 2013 Annual Report said that access to capital was one of the “four pillars” of growing women business ownership, one that could benefit from greater lending, more capital finance resources and new credit score solutions.

This source also mentioned personal and family savings, saying that it was responsible for a full quarter of women owned business expansions, compared to only 23.8 percent of male-owned business expansions.

Taking advantage of local capital financing can help spark energy for owners that want to broaden their funding options. Growth Capital can help increase access and give owners facing difficult choices a chance to reduce their own use of personal funds. Learn more about what we can offer through our mailing list, which you can register for here.