Business Plan Tips

Here are some resources to help get your business plan on paper:

• It might be helpful to start with a 1-page “Business Model Canvas” exercise:
  • Business Model Canvas
• A business plan doesn’t have to be long!  Here are some Short Form Business Plan Templates (8-12 pages):
  • Washington Small Business Development Center’s (SBDC) Basic Business Plan
  • SBDC Short Form Plan
• Here are some Traditional Business Plan Templates (35-40 pages)
  • Small Business Administration (SBA) SCORE’S downloadable template for new businesses
  • Fillable googledocs template by Tony Burch Foundation
• Business Plan-building Software can be helpful for building out (and maintaining) your business plan:
  • SBDC recommends Liveplan, a fee-based tool

Whether completing your business plan or applying for a grant or a loan, you’ll want to have some key financial information ready, such as:

• Current balance sheet and profit/loss statements (within the last 90 days)
• Three years of historical balance sheet and profit/loss statements;
• Projected financial forecasts such as: balance sheet, profit/loss, cash flow analysis.

READY FOR SOME HELP? 

You can always reach out to the Washington’s Small Business Development Center (SBDC), and request one-on-one support writing your business plan or developing your financials:

• You can submit a request for assistance through the SBDC portal, here.
• Better yet, you can also reach out directly to SBDC Advisor Paul Bowen, who has helped several Washington meat processors complete their business plans: paul.bowen@wsbdc.org  Paul can help with financial forecasting and general business planning support to meat processors.