Supporting Economic Vitality for Small Business Owners

 The Backing Small Businesses grant program, supported by American Express, empowers locally significant small businesses to overcome economic hardship, grow, and drive community impact.

     The Backing Small Businesses grant program, supported by American Express, provides support to locally significant small businesses with community reach. 

     The program is accepting applications for grants of $10,000 to fund projects that promote sustainable growth, enhance long-term resilience, and increase local impact. Following the Disaster Recovery Grants, the Backing Small Businesses grant program will launch a broader round of grants, offering 400 additional $10,000 grants to locally significant small businesses to overcome economic hardship, grow, and drive community impact.

     Applications are open for the Backing Small Business grant program from Wednesday, July 16 at 9:00 a.m. CT to Thursday, July 31 at 11:59 p.m. CT.

     Please note that project proposals for the $10,000 grant application should be feasible to achieve with only the $10,000 award and completed by the end of the calendar year. Recipients of the $10,000 grant will be required to submit a final grant report using a template provided.

     Of the five hundred (500) recipients selected through our 2025 Backing Small Business grant program, including the one hundred (100) recipients of the Disaster Recovery grants, a limited subset of twenty-five (25) will be awarded $30,000 Enhancement Grants to support transformative projects that strengthen their businesses and deepen their impact within their communities. To be eligible for a $30,000 Enhancement Grant, a recipient must have received the initial $10,000 grant and successfully completed their projects, and must not have previously received an Enhancement Grant from the Backing Small Businesses grant program. Enhancement Grant recipients will be considered based on Enhancement Grant project proposals, which must be submitted through the final grant report for the initial $10,000 grant.

     Businesses must meet the following criteria to apply: The applicant must be an owner of the business.

The applicant must be at least 18 years of age or older.

The business must be in a ​“bricks-and-mortar” location and operate in an older or historic main street, downtown, or commercial district in the United States. The business must have occupied their current bricks-and-mortar location since January 1, 2025. (Home-based businesses, even those located in historic neighborhoods, are not eligible. Brick and mortar businesses located outside of historic downtowns and commercial corridors, including, but not limited to, office parks and shopping malls are also not eligible.)

The business must be an independent business and not part of a franchise or a nonprofit.

The business must employ 20 or fewer full-time employees.

The business must have been in operation on or before January 1, 2024.

The business must be a business entity in good standing in the state in which it was formed and the state in which it does business.

The business must have an active business license, if required by state or local government. (Applicants may be asked to provide documentation if selected.) · The business must not have received a Backing Small Businesses grant in any previous cycle, nor received a grant supported by American Express in 2025 (including the Backing Small Business Disaster Recovery Grant Program)

     Applications will be reviewed based on:

- Feasibility: Can the proposed project be completed with $10,000 grant by 11:59pm CT on December 31, 2025?

- Need: What are the business’s net sales? What are some of the systemic challenges the business is facing? Applicants will be asked to explain the context of the business. For example: is the business experiencing skilled staffing shortages or supply chain issues?

- Impact: How much will the grant support the business to leverage sales, grow their customer base, or sustain the business in some way?

- Community Reach: How involved is the applicant’s small business in their community? How much would the business serve a community-specific need through a grant?

     The grant application is open from Wednesday, July 16, 2025, at 9 a.m. CT until Thursday, July 31, 2025, at 11:59 p.m. CT. The application portal is available at https://mainstreet.org/about/partner-collaborations/backing-small-businesses