Business funding in Canada. As a manager or business owner growth finance tends to be ‘ top of mind ‘ when it comes to your job of being able to identify both the type of funds you need as well as the timing around that challenge.

Growth and yes, even survival in Canada revolves around three key elements, profit, cash, and general cash flows. If you ultimately can’t get positive closure on those three issues, simply speaking, your firm won’t survive, and we read about those casualties in the Canadian business papers everyday. It’s ironic, but even companies that are experiencing some serious challenges can quite often be in growth mode.

The fundamental concept around growth finance is simple – as you sell more you need to build up more inventories, receivables, and probably some measure of fixed assets.

In the case of inventory and A/R you simply need stock on hand and your customers of course want, and often demand credit terms. Some even want better credit terms!

It might not be obvious, but as you grow you automatically become eligible for growth finance – as you pay you obligations in the ordinary course of business and customers pay you , you are in effect getting some measure of business funding – generally though .. NOT ENOUGH!

As your payables increase you have the ability to manage them for greater cash flow – in effect you’re stretching your payables or asking your valued suppliers for better / longer terms. However, if suppliers perceive you as unable to pay, or slow pay you might find they are unwilling to assist, and in fact taking the opposite tact of shortening payment terms.

Whether you think business is great ( cash flow, profits, sales ) , or if you’re experiencing challenges in any of those areas you cannot lose the fact that you need some measure of supplier finance as well as external business funding .

Many firms that find themselves in a crisis look to a couple time tested tools to accelerate cash flow internally. They do that by monitoring and focusing on sales to inventory and sales to A/R relationships. Managing those two carefully typically can get any company back on track.

Business funding in Canada, for the majority, is done via or chartered banks. But many firms find they might no longer be in a position to either get any business credit, or, as common, the amount of credit they need.

So are there secrets and alternatives to other Canadian business financing alternatives? New capital and cash flow can come into your company from a variety of sources.

They include:

Receivable financing
Asset based lending
Sale leaseback / bridge loan strategies
Tax Credit Monetization
Unsecured cash flow loans

All of these are available from a variety of sources. The trick or challenge rather is determining which one you need, when, and from whom?

Speak to a trusted, credible and experienced Canadian business financing advisor who can assist you in determine solutions to growth finance.