No matter where you live, each state offers a selection of grants to people living in the state. At the state level is where you will likely find grants for attending school. This might be a pre-start-up cost for you if you require some training before you begin your new business, so this is an indirect advantage of grant money available at the state level. Although many of these programs are focused on providing state grants for low and middle-income students to attend college, there are some grants available for businesses.

For example, did you know that on the Governor of Texas's website they list procurement opportunities? If your business sells furniture, or if your business provides services such as computer programming and service, maintenance and repair, moving services, or temporary personnel, then your business might be eligible to "procure" the contracts and you would make the money for them. This is not a grant per se, but it does offer the opportunity for a business to get money that does not have to be paid back.

If you are in New York, the state's Governor's Office of Regulatory Reform site offers tax credits for businesses that operate and are certified in the Empire Zone. This will save your business money, and make it easier for you to stay in business and put your money toward expanding the business rather than paying taxes. New York also offers low-rate loans for existing small business expansion.

If you want to relocate a business to New Jersey, the state offers a grant in the form of tax credits to offset your business taxes. The grant can be as high as eighty percent of your taxes, so it definitely pays to look into these types of opportunities at the state level. There are also grants available for employee training in job safety and health and basic literacy skills.

If you live in Connecticut, according to the state's office of Policy and Management you may be eligible for a grant for $10,000 if you are an individual or company with less than 30 employees that has created a renewable energy technology that has not yet been sold. You can use the money for such purposes as product development and testing, developing your business plan or meeting your payroll, among others.

This is just a small selection of what type of business assistance is available at the state level, but it gives you a jumping off point of some of the places in your state where grant money might be available. It also is wise to remember that, in terms of state grants, many foundations and non-profit organizations give grants to people living in a particular state, but mostly those people have to be a non-profit organization or affiliated with one and not an individual in order to qualify.

State grants are a great source of getting funding from your business but they only account for some of the available sources of grants.