One of the biggest challenges when it comes to opening your own business or growing an existing one is capital. Or rather, knowing the right place to look for funding.

Enter: CommunityWorks, one of Greenville’s best kept small business lending secrets. This financial nonprofit has been providing business coaching + small business lending to local entrepreneurs since 2013. CommunityWorks’ has provided over $2.6 million in small business loans to entrepreneurs in Greenville and throughout South Carolina.

In 2017, 29 small business received loans from CommunityWorks.

Here are a few stories from some of those entrepreneurs:

Justin Smith dreamed of owning a CrossFit gym to help people adopt healthy lifestyles and provide more stable income for his growing family. He had a strong business plan, he just lacked start-up capital to open his CrossFit gym in Greenwood. He first tried a bank, but the minimum loan amount was around $50,000, which was far more than he needed. “What I needed was a microloan,” he says. “So I got on the internet and searched, and I found CommunityWorks.” With the money borrowed, Justin was able to buy equipment for the gym and complete his certification to teach and operate a Crossfit gym.

Debra Stokes had been operating her janitorial services business, Mop & Bucket for a year when she went to CW for a loan to grow her business. In addition to helping Stokes monetarily, CommunityWorks also provided her with a business coach. “CommunityWorks has been such a great asset. This vision is so much bigger than me. My goal is to put people to work.” After paying off her first loan of $5,000, Debra returned to CommunityWorks’ for another loan of $8,900 to take her business to the next level.

Loans are available from $5,000-$250,000 for start-up and existing businesses. “CommunityWorks is more than a lender. We consider ourselves a partner to our small business clients. In addition to lending capital to our entrepreneurs, we invest in them through business coaching and technical training. We really want to see clients grow and thrive,” said Archie Johnson, Small Business Lending Manager at CommunityWorks.

This post was created in partnership with CommunityWorks.