Quarterly $3K grants plus 30 days strategic coaching for creative entrepreneurs with LLC or 501(c)(3). $15 fee. Auto-entry to $10K annual bonus.
$3K quarterly plus 30 days coaching
LLC or 501(c)(3) under $500K revenue
Under $125K last-quarter revenue required
$15 non-refundable entry fee required
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Sign in to save this grantMost grant advisors will tell you to run the moment you see an application fee. They're not wrong - scam grants use fees to profit from rejections. But the Outta Excuses Grant operates on a different model that looks more like a contest with coaching benefits than traditional nonprofit funding. Autrina Tillman runs this through her Be Intentional coaching practice, which means the $15 isn't just covering administrative costs. It's filtering for people willing to invest in their own application. That distinction matters. You're not just competing for $3,000 quarterly.
You're entering a funnel that leads to 30 days of strategic coaching, and potentially the $10,000 annual prize awarded live at the Funding & Wealth Summit in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Quarterly winners receive $3,000. The annual winner - selected from quarterly applicants - gets $10,000 awarded live at the September summit in Charlotte. But here's what most listings miss. Every quarterly winner gets 30 days of free weekly strategic coaching from Autrina Tillman's team. At market rates for business coaching, that's potentially $1,500 to $3,000 in additional value beyond the cash.
Three additional applicants per cycle receive coaching-only awards - no cash, but the full 30-day strategic engagement. That's four growth opportunities every quarter, not just one. For businesses stuck at a specific growth plateau, the strategic guidance might outvalue the $3,000 itself. That's the angle competitors aren't highlighting.
Past recipients are published on the official site with names, business names, and award amounts attached. Amaka Rose won $10,000. Kim Cross won $3,000 for Zhi Bath & Body LLC. Tillies Daniel won $3,000 for TalentCore Strategies. AW Burgess won $3,000 for his firm. Fifteen named recipients in total - concrete evidence that this program pays out, not a theoretical future promise.
Be Intentional LLC and Tillman Group and Associates LLC are the two formal co-sponsors - two separate legal entities, not a solo operator with a website. Autrina Tillman, the founder, spent over two decades in small business coaching before launching this grant. Her stated reason was consistent across every description of the program: she kept working with clients who had real businesses and real potential but needed money more than another strategy session.
Applications are reviewed by Be Intentional Coaching and the Outta Excuses Advisory Board jointly. No public scoring rubric exists anywhere in the materials I reviewed. That opacity creates anxiety for applicants who don't know how their responses will be weighted. What the panel weights is not stated. That gap is precisely why the narrative fields matter more than the form's length suggests.
Here's where most third-party summaries get this wrong. The revenue threshold is not a single number. The official eligibility page specifies two separate requirements that must both be true simultaneously: less than $500,000 in 2023 gross annual revenue, and less than $125,000 in the most recent quarter. NerdWallet's roundup cites only the quarterly figure. Neither covers both. If you've been self-assessing from those sources, you've been working with half the picture.
Let me show you how this works with concrete examples. Business A generated $450,000 in 2023 with $110,000 in Q4. They qualify on both counts. Business B generated $480,000 annually but $135,000 in their last quarter. They don't qualify, regardless of their annual total. The quarterly cap is stricter than the annual cap, and it's independently enforced. Does your accounting system track quarterly revenue separately from annual? Most do, but you'll need to pull those specific figures for documentation.
The tool above checks your basic qualifications against the official requirements. If you're eligible, you'll want to submit an assessment for expert review of your narrative before paying the application fee. If you're unsure about any criteria - especially the dual revenue caps - book a live 1-on-1 consultation with a grant expert. If you don't qualify, we'll match you with grants that fit your specific business profile.
Here's the part of the eligibility I cannot fully resolve from outside the program. The official eligibility page includes this line: "Must be a creative entrepreneur as defined here." That phrase - "as defined here" - implies a link to a definition somewhere. But whatever it points to was not accessible in any version of the page I reviewed. I checked prior cycle listings too. The same undefined reference appears across multiple quarters. This is not a new omission or a recently broken link. It has been consistently inaccessible.
The creative entrepreneur eligibility criterion is referenced on the official site but its definition was not accessible in any reviewed version of the page. Contact grant@outtaexcuses.com to confirm whether your business profile meets this requirement before paying the $15 entry fee.
Important Note
What can I infer? Looking at the 15 named past recipients - a digital design studio, a bath and body product company, a healthcare consulting firm, a small business coaching practice - the common thread seems to point toward brand-building entrepreneurs rather than traditional manufacturing or commodity businesses. But that is inference from a small sample, not a confirmed definition. Don't assume you qualify because your business feels creative. Don't assume you don't qualify because you operate in a service category. Get the definition from the source.
The application lives at outtaexcuses.com/apply - a Wix-hosted form that asks for roughly eight pieces of information. Name, phone, gender, email, company name, state of registration, business start date, annual revenue, website or social media link, a description of your business story and nature, and how you plan to use the funding. Two of those items - the business story and the funding use description - are open text with no stated word limit and no published reviewer guidance on what a strong answer looks like.
The mission language Autrina Tillman uses throughout the program - moving from hustle to ease and building sweatless victories - is the closest public signal to what the advisory board is likely looking for. Application narratives that speak directly to this framing read differently to a review panel steeped in this program's philosophy than generic business growth descriptions.
Expert Tip
Before you pay the $15 fee, consider having those narrative answers reviewed. The fee is non-refundable. Getting feedback on your story angle - whether your business truly reads as "creative," whether your funding use plan resonates - can save you from donating $15 to a rejection pile.
Q: Is the $15 entry fee refundable if I don't win?
A: No. The fee is non-refundable regardless of application outcome. It covers platform setup and administrative management costs per the donor disclosure. The fee does separate casual browsers from committed applicants, which affects your competitive pool. Fewer total applicants means better odds for those who do apply. That's the tradeoff.
Submit an assessment to review your ROI before applying
Q: What business structures qualify for the Outta Excuses Grant?
A: Only registered LLCs or 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations. Sole proprietorships, S-corps, C-corps, and other entity types don't qualify. You'll need to upload official registration documentation during the application. If you're operating without formal LLC or nonprofit registration, this grant isn't the right fit.
Get expert help with your application narrative
Q: How does the $10,000 bonus grant work?
A: All applicants who submit a quarterly application are automatically entered into the September 2026 bonus drawing. No separate application is required. No additional fee. You apply once for the quarterly cycle, you're entered for both the $3K quarterly award and the $10K annual bonus. The bonus drawing occurs once per year in September based on the pattern from prior cycles.
Q: Does the annual revenue cap apply to 2023 specifically or to current revenue?
A: The current eligibility language specifies 2023 gross annual revenue - not trailing 12 months and not current-year revenue. Whether that baseline year updates with each new program cycle has not been confirmed publicly. Contact grant@outtaexcuses.com to verify before assuming your current figures are the ones being evaluated.
Submit an assessment for document review
Q: Can nonprofits apply for the Outta Excuses Grant?
A: Yes. The official eligibility page explicitly includes registered 501(c)3 nonprofits alongside for-profit LLCs. Most third-party listings omit nonprofit eligibility entirely. The same dual revenue threshold - $500,000 annual and $125,000 quarterly - applies to nonprofits exactly as it does to for-profit businesses.
Q: Can I apply again if I wasn't selected in a previous cycle?
A: The official eligibility materials don't address reapplication policy. I searched community discussions and past winner announcements without finding a definitive answer. You may be able to apply in subsequent quarters, but that's not confirmed in official materials. This is where expert consultation adds value - other applicants' experiences may provide insights not published anywhere.
Schedule a consultation to discuss reapplication strategy
If this grant doesn't match your profile - maybe the entity type doesn't fit, or the revenue caps are too restrictive - I've curated alternatives with similar structures. The Secretsos Small Business Grants USA also runs quarterly cycles with a $15 fee and focuses on underserved entrepreneurs. The Breva Thrive Grant offers $5,000 quarterly with a community impact angle. For e-commerce businesses, the FedEx E-Commerce Learning Lab has the same $500,000 revenue cap but focuses on digital commerce growth.
This grant falls into our standard complexity tier based on the evidence: a seven-field online application with no Letter of Intent phase, requiring only revenue documentation and business registration proof. The estimated time investment is approximately 2 hours for a prepared applicant.
Because third-party submission is not permitted - you must apply directly through the donor's Wix portal - our Full Application Submission service is not available for this grant. Instead, we focus on what creates value: pre-submission assessment and narrative review.
Pricing drivers for this grant include the short deadline window (quarterly cycles mean frequent opportunities but also frequent cutoffs) and the subjective evaluation criteria that favor specific narrative framing. We offer two billing models: upfront assessment review or milestone-based coaching through multiple quarterly cycles if you don't win on first attempt.
The exact quote appears in the assessment modal before any payment is required. No surprises.
For applicants who want hands-on support, our expert consultation service provides live 1-on-1 video or phone calls with grant specialists. They'll review your narrative drafts, flag disqualifying phrasing before submission, and help position your application competitively relative to other applicants in this cycle. This isn't about re-explaining eligibility - the listing already covers that. This is about catching the errors that cause rejection despite meeting all stated requirements.
Schedule Expert Consultation ->
I've spent years analyzing quarterly grant structures for small business owners and entrepreneurs. The Outta Excuses Grant caught my attention because of its dual-benefit model - cash plus coaching - which differs from the cash-only quarterly grants that dominate search results. I've tracked winner announcements across multiple cycles to understand selection patterns. What I found: applicants who articulate specific growth obstacles and learning goals outperform those who submit generic "I need funding" narratives. That insight comes from pattern analysis, not official donor disclosure. I share it because I want qualified applicants to succeed, not waste cycles on applications that don't resonate with the review panel.
I maintain this listing with current deadline information and eligibility details because third-party aggregators frequently publish outdated or incorrect data. The FundingTrail profile incorrectly lists this as "rolling" when it's periodic quarterly. NerdWallet's summary omits the $15 fee entirely. My job is ensuring you have accurate information before you invest application time. If you have questions this listing doesn't answer, my consultation service is available for live 1-on-1 discussions about your specific situation.
Learn more about my background and approach to grant research or schedule a consultation to discuss your application strategy.
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