Seated Together Small Business Microgrant
Seated Together, LLC
Up to $750 ($1,000 veteran-owned)
Up to $750, or $1,000 for veteran-owned businesses, for US small businesses. Rolling applications, quarterly review, $5 non-refundable fee.
The Seated Together Small Business Microgrant gives eligible businesses anywhere in the United States up to $750, and qualifying veteran-owned businesses up to $1,000. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis and reviewed in quarterly cycles. Startup, pre-revenue, home-based and online businesses can apply; the applicant must be 18 or older. A non-refundable $5 fee applies to each application. Seated Together calls itself veteran-owned and community-driven, and gives a preference to Volusia County, Florida when applications are otherwise comparable. The form asks four written questions of up to 300 words each.
- Funding type
- Grant
- Level
- Private
- Amount range
- $1,000
- Realistic amount
- Up to $750, or up to $1,000 for qualifying veteran-owned businesses.
- Deadline
- Rolling; reviewed in quarterly cycles
- Status
- active
- States
- Nationwide
Who qualifies
- Businesses operating anywhere within the United States
- Existing, startup, pre-revenue, home-based and online businesses
- Applicant at least 18 years old
- For-profit business
- Volusia County, Florida preferred when otherwise comparable; veteran-owned (51%) businesses get extra consideration
What the Seated Together Small Business Microgrant application asks
The Seated Together Small Business Microgrant application asks four written questions, alongside your contact and business details. The entry fee is $5. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis and reviewed in quarterly cycles, and you submit on the funder’s own form at seatedtogether.com. These are the questions as they appear on the form:
-
1
Describe your business in 300 words maximum.
Form limit: 300 words
-
2
How would you use the grant? (300 words maximum)
Form limit: 300 words
-
3
What impact would this grant have on your business? (300 words maximum)
Form limit: 300 words
-
4
Why should your business receive this grant? (300 words maximum)
Form limit: 300 words
What the judges look for
- Demonstrated business need
- A specific, feasible use of the funds
- Potential for business growth
- Community impact or jobs
- Fit with the program's purpose
GrantCompass drafts the Seated Together Small Business Microgrant application from your own answers. You answer four short questions about your business and we write all four answers around what the judges look for, to fit the form. We use only what you tell us: nothing is invented, and anything a stronger answer needs is left as a marked blank for you to fill. The preview is free with no card. The full draft is $9, refunded in full within 7 days if it doesn’t make your application stronger. You review it and submit it yourself; GrantCompass is independent and not affiliated with Seated Together. Start a free draft on this page (grantcompass.co/grants/seated-together-small-business-microgrant), or read how the drafting works.
How to answer the Seated Together Small Business Microgrant application questions (with examples)
The Seated Together form has four boxes of up to 300 words, and the grant is up to $750, or up to $1,000 if veteran‑owned. Only “Business Background” and “Tell Your Story” are required, but the two optional ones are where you answer three of the factors the Official Rules list: “proposed use of grant funds,” “potential for business growth” and “community impact.” Fill them in. The four examples below come from one made-up business asking for $750; swap in details only you have.
Q1 · Business Background · required“Describe your business in 300 words maximum.”
- 1
Say what you sell, to whom and where in the first two sentences. A separate optional box lists your products or services, so name only the main one here.
- 2
Give your start date and what you have built: customers, revenue, a pilot. Startups and pre-revenue businesses can apply.
- 3
End on proof that people want it. Repeat customers, referrals, a waitlist.
“I run a mobile bike-repair business in Greensboro, North Carolina. I fix bikes in people’s driveways and workplaces, and at my Saturday stall outside the public library. I opened in March 2025, after nine years as a mechanic at a neighborhood bike shop that closed when its owner retired. I am a sole proprietor and the only employee.
Most of my work is the everyday kind that keeps people riding, such as flat tires, brakes, chains, tune-ups and wheel truing. A basic tune-up costs $65 and a flat repair $15 plus parts. I work from my garage and a small trailer I tow behind my car, which carries a repair stand, my tools and a box of common parts.
Most of my customers ride because they need to. They are restaurant and warehouse workers who commute by bike, students, and parents keeping their kids’ bikes going. Since the shop closed, the nearest full-service shop is about 11 miles from the east side of town, where most of them live.
In 2025 I did 412 repairs and brought in $24,600. Nine in ten customers found me by word of mouth or at the library stall, which the library lets me run free every Saturday morning. About a third already come back each season.”
Why it works: what she does, where and since when all come in the first three sentences, and the last paragraph proves demand with numbers.
Q2 · Specify the reason for applying · optional“How would you use the grant? (300 words maximum)”
It speaks to “proposed use of grant funds” and “feasibility of the proposed project.”
- 1
Price each purchase, adding up to $750 (or $1,000 for the veteran-owned grant).
- 2
Say what each one changes. Hours saved, jobs you can take, people you can reach.
- 3
Leave out uses the rules forbid, such as “repayment of existing debt” and “payment of taxes.”
Show the made-up example 203 words
“I would use the $750 to nearly double what my Saturday library stall can handle. Today I can fix only one bike at a time there, and most Saturdays I send people home with bikes I could not get to. The grant would buy three things:
$310 buys a second portable repair stand and a wheel-truing stand, so a second person can work beside me.
$265 buys a starter stock of the parts I use most, such as tubes, tires, brake pads and chains, at wholesale prices. Buying them retail on the day costs about a third more and sometimes means a second visit.
$175 buys a weighted pop-up canopy and a printed sign, so the stall can run in rain or sun.
That is $750 in all, and none of it goes to debt, taxes or my own living costs.
The second stand is for a part-time apprentice. The library runs a teen job program, and its coordinator has offered to send me a student who wants to learn bike repair. I would pay the apprentice $13 an hour for four hours each Saturday, out of the extra repairs. I can buy everything on this list within two weeks of an award.”
Why it works: every dollar has a price and a job, the total is exactly $750, and the purchases set up the next answer.
Q3 · Grant Impact · optional“What impact would this grant have on your business? (300 words maximum)”
It speaks to “potential for business growth,” “job creation or workforce development” and “community impact.”
- 1
Turn the purchases into a number: more customers, orders or hours.
- 2
Name the job or skill it creates, and who around you gains.
- 3
Say how you will measure it.
Show the made-up example 195 words
“This grant would turn my Saturday stall from a one-person line into a small repair shop for the east side, one morning a week.
For the business, it means more repairs in the same four hours. Today I finish about eight bikes on a Saturday. With a second stand, an apprentice handling flats and brakes, and parts already in the box, I expect about fourteen. Stall jobs average about $40, so those six extra bikes come to about $240 a Saturday, or about $12,000 over a year of Saturdays. That would grow my yearly revenue by about half, and it covers the apprentice’s wages several times over.
For jobs, it creates a paid, part-time apprenticeship for a local teenager, with a real trade at the end of it.
For the community, it means fewer people stranded. Many of my customers ride to work because they don’t have a car, and a broken chain can cost them a shift. More repairs on Saturday means more of them riding to work on Monday.
I will count Saturday repairs every week and compare them with the same months last year, so I will know whether it is working.”
Why it works: it takes the three factors in turn and gives each a figure or a named group of people.
Q4 · Tell Your Story · required“Why should your business receive this grant? (300 words maximum)”
Near the end of the form, after the file upload. It speaks to “demonstrated business need” and to the program’s purpose, which is to help businesses “start, grow, strengthen, or expand.”
- 1
Open with why you started, in a moment only you could tell.
- 2
Show what you have already put in yourself, in money and in work.
- 3
Make the need a scene the committee can picture, then tie the grant to the program’s purpose.
Show the made-up example 206 words
“When the shop where I worked for nine years closed, the east side of Greensboro lost its only place to get a bike fixed. Within a month, three regular customers had called my cell phone asking where to go. So I started this business with $3,100 of my own savings, spent on a used repair stand and a trailer I built from a kit, plus the tools I already had.
Today the business pays for itself, with no loans and no debt. I have kept my prices close to the old shop’s, because my customers ride to work, not for sport. I fix kids’ bikes at cost in the week before school starts, and I run the library stall every Saturday, rain or shine.
What holds me back is capacity, not demand. Last Saturday I had eleven bikes waiting at noon and could finish seven. I can’t buy a second stand and a stock of parts at once without cutting into the money that keeps the business running.
Your program exists to help small businesses grow and create jobs in their communities. This grant would let me take on a paid apprentice and fix nearly twice as many bikes for the people who most need them.”
Why it works: the need is something you can see (eleven bikes waiting, seven fixed), and the ask names the program’s own goals, growth and jobs.
| Field | What to know |
|---|---|
| Funding option required | “$750 Standard Grant” or “$1000 Veteran-Owned Business Grant.” Veteran-owned means at least 51% owned and controlled by US military veterans, and you may be asked for proof. |
| Priority Consideration required | Tick what is true: Volusia County, FL; Washington, DC; 51% veteran-owned; a past Seated Together microgrant; or None. |
| Business Structure required | Nonprofit is on the menu, but the rules exclude “Nonprofit organizations.” |
| Financial Snapshot, Operational Need optional | A revenue band, and how long you could keep operating without funding. Keep both in line with Question 4. |
What Seated Together itself says to watch
- Every figure must be true. The rules say knowingly giving “false, misleading, or incomplete information” can mean disqualification or repaying an award.
- Drafting help is allowed. The Terms and Conditions say: “The use of artificial intelligence or other drafting tools is permitted.” What you submit must still be true and “your own authorized work.”
- One application at a time. The Terms allow “one active application per business,” and each new application needs a new $5 fee.
- No set cycle, no appeal. An application may not be reviewed “during any particular Quarterly Cycle,” and “No appeal process exists.”
Want all four answers written from your own details? Start your free draft preview. You see the preview before you pay anything.
What it covers
Eligible expenses
- Business use of grant funds (the Official Rules govern details)
Ineligible expenses
- See official program guidance
How to apply
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1
Fill in the online form
Business details, products and services list, funding requested and an operational-need dropdown.
~30 min
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2
Write four short answers
Describe your business; how you would use the grant; the impact on your business; why you should receive it (300 words each).
~2 hrs
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3
Pay the $5 fee
Non-refundable application fee.
~5 min
The four essays are public on the form, so draft them in advance; reviewers judge need, use of funds and feasibility.
Deadline & timing
Rules 4.1: "Applications are accepted on a rolling basis through the Program website." A Quarterly Cycle is a review period set by the sponsor; dates are not published. A non-refundable $5 application fee applies. Veteran-owned (51%) businesses get extra consideration. The Terms and Conditions permit AI drafting tools.
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Required documents
- Online form with four written answers
- $5 non-refundable fee
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