Corporate small business grants in Canada: the honest list
Large companies give cash to Canadian small businesses, mostly through yearly contests. We track 15 corporate programs that fund businesses directly, from TELUS, Amex, BMO, FedEx, DoorDash and others. Most pay $10,000 a winner; the largest, TELUS #StandWithOwners, gave three $125,000 packages in 2026. Seven of the 15 are only for women-owned, Black-owned or under-40 founders.
See all 19 programs ↓Every corporate small business grant in Canada, filterable
All 19 corporate-sponsored grant and contest programs in our catalog, including the 4 that fund nonprofits rather than businesses (people search for those as business grants, so we list them honestly). Filter by who can enter, or show only what is open today. Statuses as of October 16, 2026, from our catalogue.
Showing all 19 programs.
| Program | Award | Who can enter | Status (October 16, 2026) |
|---|---|---|---|
| TELUS #StandWithOwnersTELUS | 3 grand prizes of $125,000 (funding, technology and exposure) + 6 community awards of $10,000 + a $25,000 public-vote prize | Any Canadian business with 1 to 100 employees, registered and revenue-generating | 2026 closed Sept 2; 2027 TBD |
| Amber Grant for WomenWomensNet (US-based) | $15,000 USD monthly; $75,000 USD year-end awards | Women-owned businesses in Canada or the US; $15 USD application fee | Open, monthly deadlines |
| BOF Licence & Certification ReimbursementBlack Opportunity Fund / CIBC Foundation | Up to $2,000 per calendar year | Black-owned or Black-led Canadian businesses, for required licences, permits and certifications | Open, no published deadline |
| Purolator True North Grant ContestPurolator | $25,000 + $500 shipping credit, 5 winners | Canadian businesses with 50 or fewer employees; 2 of 5 grants reserved for Purolator customers | Nominations expected Sept 2026 |
| Meridian Small Business Big Impact AwardsMeridian Credit Union | $10,000 for 15 regional winners + a $50,000 grand prize | Ontario businesses only: under 50 employees, under $10M revenue, 12+ months operating | Nominations open until Nov 30, 2026 |
| TELUS Indigenous Communities FundTELUS | $5,000 to $25,000 | Indigenous-led organizations and nonprofits, not private businesses | Fall intake Sept 10 to Oct 7, 2026 |
| Pizza Hut Equal Slice GrantPizza Hut Canada / Startup Canada | $10,000, 5 winners per cycle | Any Canadian entrepreneur; priority (not a requirement) for underrepresented founders | Next cycle Nov 24, 2026; apps expected Sept to Oct |
| FedEx #BackingSmall ContestFedEx Canada | $25,000 grand prize + 10 prizes of $10,000 + 5 of $5,000 | For-profit Canadian businesses, 6+ months old, up to 99 employees; requires a FedEx shipment during the contest period | Between intakes, annual |
| Zensurance Small Business GrantZensurance | $10,000 for 2 winners + $1,000 for 8 finalists | Registered Canadian businesses under $1M revenue; requires an insurance quote or being a customer | Open until Dec 18, 2026 |
| Amex Backing Canadian Small BusinessesAmerican Express / DMZ | $10,000 to 100 businesses per year | Incorporated, independent (non-franchise) Canadian businesses under $1.5M revenue | 2026 closed May 19; next ~spring 2027 |
| Mastercard Small Business FundMastercard / Pier Five | $10,000, 10 winners per year | Women-owned (51%+) Canadian businesses, 1 to 99 employees, under $1M revenue, 1+ year operating | 2026 closed; next expected early 2027 |
| BMO Celebrating Women GrantBMO Financial Group | $10,000, 10 winners per year | Businesses 51%+ owned by women, non-binary or trans women, 2+ years operating, with demonstrated community impact | 2026 closed Apr 23; next ~April 2027 |
| RBC Rock My Business Start-Up AwardsFuturpreneur / RBC Foundation | $10,000, 8 awards per year | Canadians aged 18 to 39 with a pre-launch or side-hustle business (under $25,000 in sales); Futurpreneur workshops required first | 2026 closed June 26; next expected mid-2027 |
| DoorDash #BlackFoodEnergy GrantDoorDash / Black Opportunity Fund | $10,220 per recipient, ~30 per cohort | Black-owned or Black-led Canadian restaurants, food-service businesses and virtual kitchens | Between rounds; next not announced |
| Cassels Black-Owned Small Business GrantCassels / Wheaton Precious Metals | Shared pool up to $100,000 per cycle + pro bono legal services | Black-owned or Black-operated small businesses in Toronto, Vancouver or Calgary | 2026 cycle not yet announced |
| CUA Community Investment GrantCredit Union Atlantic | Up to $7,500 (small business stream) | Nova Scotia small businesses, nonprofits and community groups | 2026 closed Jan 30; 2027 TBD |
| ScotiaRISE Community Investment GrantsScotiabank | $25,000 to $150,000 typical | Registered charities and nonprofits only, not private businesses | Open, rolling intake |
| Bell Let's Talk Community FundBell Canada | Up to $25,000 | Registered charities delivering mental health services, not private businesses | Between intakes; next ~May 2027 |
| Rogers Youth GrantsRogers Communications | $10,000 or $25,000 (two tiers) | Registered charities and community organizations serving youth ages 12 to 29, not private businesses | Between intakes; 2026 timing TBD |
No corporate program in that group is open today. That is normal: most of these run one short intake per year. The government funding map below has programs that are open year-round.
Program details trace to GrantCompass catalog records, each verified against the sponsor's own program page; see the Sources section. Closed programs (Visa She's Next, Desjardins GoodSpark) are excluded from this table and covered below.A corporate small business grant is a cash award funded from a company's marketing or community budget rather than by government. In Canada the notable ones are the Amber Grant ($15,000 USD monthly, women-owned businesses), TELUS #StandWithOwners (closed September 2, 2026; 2027 dates not announced), the Amex Backing Canadian Small Businesses Grant ($10,000 to 100 businesses, annual), BMO Celebrating Women, and contest-style programs from FedEx, Purolator, Mastercard, Pizza Hut and Zensurance. The median standard award is $10,000, intakes are short and annual, and winning odds are usually below 5%. They are worth a low-effort entry, but the substantial money for Canadian businesses is the government list, which is roughly 24 times larger.
Updated October 28, 2026. Every program name, amount, status and date on this page traces to our catalog records or to the sponsor sources listed at the bottom.
What corporate grants really are (and are not)
That structure explains everything that surprises first-time applicants. Corporate grants have no published rubric the way government programs do. They close for 10 or 11 months of the year. Several tie entry to the sponsor's own product: FedEx requires a shipment during the contest period, Zensurance requires an insurance quote or an existing policy, and 2 of Purolator's 5 grants are reserved for its own customers. None of that makes them scams; it makes them marketing, and you should enter them the way you would enter a contest, not the way you would apply for a government grant.
| Corporate grants | Government grants | |
|---|---|---|
| Typical amount | $10,000 (median standard award across the 15 business-facing programs) | 185 of 357 live programs have ceilings of $100,000+ |
| How you win | Contest judging, sometimes public voting; no published rubric | Published eligibility criteria; qualify and apply |
| When you can apply | One short window a year, most closed by mid-summer | Many rolling or multi-intake programs, open year-round |
Treat corporate grants as a lottery ticket, never as a funding plan. The best use for a busy owner is a low-effort entry to the one or two programs whose profile you actually match, entered in the right window, while your real funding search runs on the government list where the cheques are 10 to 50 times larger.
Why do banks and telecoms give away $10,000 grants at all?
Because it is efficient marketing. A $100,000 prize pool buys a national campaign in which thousands of small businesses write enthusiastic essays about the sponsor, share contest links with their customers, and generate months of local press about the winners. TELUS, for example, structures #StandWithOwners grand prizes as packages of funding, technology and advertising exposure rather than pure cash, which turns each winner into a case study. Several programs also collect a commercial signal at entry: FedEx requires a shipment, Zensurance requires an insurance quote, and Purolator reserves 2 of its 5 grants for existing customers. Understanding the sponsor's motive is useful, not cynical: programs judge partly on story value, so an entry that gives the brand a story it can tell tends to outperform a dry description of revenue growth.
What is actually open right now
Because these are annual contests, the honest picture splits into what is confirmed, what is expected, and what nobody has announced. We separate the three rather than dressing expectations up as facts:
Confirmed open
- TELUS #StandWithOwners: applications run June 2 to September 2, 2026, with winners announced October 1. Any registered, revenue-generating Canadian business with 1 to 100 employees can enter; self-nomination is accepted.
- Amber Grant: applications close at the end of each month, every month. Women-owned businesses only; see the honest breakdown in the next section.
- BOF Licence & Certification Reimbursement: rolling intake with no fixed deadline; the $2,000 limit resets each calendar year.
Dated or expected next intakes
| Program | Next window | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| TELUS Indigenous Communities Fund | Sept 10 to Oct 7, 2026 | Published fall intake; closes early if 200 applications arrive first (nonprofits only) |
| Pizza Hut Equal Slice | Cycle date Nov 24, 2026 | Published national virtual cycle; applications expected Sept to Oct |
| Purolator True North | ~Sept 2026 | Expected from the program's annual cadence, not yet announced |
| Meridian Big Impact (Ontario) | Open until Nov 30, 2026 | Nominations open, per the program's record checked October 5, 2026 |
Not yet announced
The Amex, BMO, Mastercard, Zensurance, RBC Rock My Business and CUA cycles for the next year, the next DoorDash #BlackFoodEnergy round, the 2026 Cassels cycle, and the Rogers Youth Grants 2026 window have no published dates. Anyone telling you a specific opening date for these is guessing; the honest answer is that these sponsors announce 4 to 8 weeks before opening, which is exactly what the alert box at the bottom of this page is for.
The Amber Grant in Canada, honestly
The Amber Grant is the single most-searched corporate grant among Canadian founders, and most pages that rank for it skip the parts that matter. It is run by WomensNet, a US organization, and has operated since 1998. The mechanics: one application (a short story about your business, no business plan required) enters you for that month's $15,000 USD awards. Monthly winners are then in the running for the year-end $75,000 USD awards, which go to 3 of the roughly 36 monthly winners.
What that means for a Canadian applicant, concretely:
- The cheque is USD, so a $15,000 award is worth more in Canadian dollars, but every figure you see on Amber's site is not in your currency.
- It is women-owned only: the applicant must be a woman, 18 or older, who owns at least 50% of the business. That is a hard reservation, not a preference.
- The $15 USD fee is real (a waiver is available), and applications do not roll forward month to month for the general grant, so a serious entrant is paying repeatedly.
- The odds are lottery-shaped: three $15,000 winners per month from an applicant pool spanning the entire US and Canada puts the estimated approval rate below 1%.
The Amber Grant is worth one well-written entry for a woman-owned Canadian business with a genuinely compelling story, because the application is short. It is not worth entering every month on repeat: at $15 USD per month against sub-1% odds, that is a subscription to a raffle, and the same story effort aimed at BMO Celebrating Women or the Mastercard fund (both Canada-only pools, so thinner competition) goes further.
Is the Amber Grant legitimate for Canadian businesses?
Yes. WomensNet has run the Amber Grant since 1998 and explicitly accepts businesses based in Canada as well as the United States, and Canadian businesses have won it. The confusion comes from three places. First, the amounts are US dollars, which many Canadian listicles quote as if they were CAD. Second, there is a $15 USD application fee, which reads as a red flag if you expect grants to be free to enter; here it is disclosed up front and a waiver exists. Third, the program is often listed beside government grants as if it worked the same way, when it is closer to a monthly contest with a very large applicant pool. Legitimate, then, but be clear-eyed: it is reserved for women-owned businesses, and the realistic outcome for any single entry is a loss.
Is the Amber Grant real? Check any grant offer in 30 seconds
Tick any sign that fits the offer in front of you, whatever name it uses.
How three programs on this page read against the list:
- Amber Grant for WomenOne sign, explainedThe $15 USD fee is the only fee WomensNet charges, and it is non-refundable. A fee-waived application is available by email. WomensNet says it never asks for money to pay out a grant.
- Purolator True NorthNamed winnersIts contest page lists the five 2025 recipients, each awarded $25,000 plus $500 in shipping.
- TELUS #StandWithOwnersRules and a long windowThe 2026 round ran June 2 to September 2, with winners announced October 1.
A real contest is still a long shot. Government programs are larger, and you qualify on criteria, not judging (see the government list). See the programs your business qualifies for →
The TELUS small business grant: #StandWithOwners, between rounds
The three 2026 categories were Future Forward, Business Growth and AI Innovation. The People's Choice award goes to one of the nine winners after the public votes, so it is a bonus for a winner, not a separate way in.
- Applications opened.
- Applications closed at 11:59 p.m. EDT.
- Winners announced; public voting opened for People's Choice.
- People's Choice winner announced. 2027 dates not yet published.
TELUS has not announced 2027 dates. Get told when 2027 opens →
Who can enter, going by the 2026 rules:
- A business operating in Canada with 1 to 100 employees, legally registered and earning revenue.
- For-profits, registered charities, not-for-profits and social enterprises; charities and not-for-profits meet extra conditions.
- The owner applies, or an employee with written permission from the owner, president or CEO. There is no third-party nomination.
A separate TELUS door for Indigenous-led organizations. The TELUS Indigenous Communities Fund gives one-time grants of $5,000 to $25,000 to Indigenous-led organizations, Band Councils and nonprofits, not private businesses. Both 2026 intakes are closed; TELUS reviews twice a year and closes each intake early once 200 applications arrive. Full entry rules for the contest are on the TELUS #StandWithOwners program page.
Source: GrantCompass catalogue records for TELUS #StandWithOwners (checked September 29, 2026) and the TELUS Indigenous Communities Fund (checked October 12, 2026), from telus.com. Read October 16, 2026.Who each corporate grant is actually reserved for
7 of the 15 business-facing programs are reserved by demographic or age. That is not fine print; it is the single most common reason an entry is disqualified. Find your row before you spend an evening on an application.
You have the deepest corporate bench in Canada: the Amber Grant (open now, monthly, USD), BMO Celebrating Women (10 awards of $10,000, next intake around April 2027), and the Mastercard Small Business Fund (10 awards of $10,000, next expected early 2027). BMO requires 2+ years of operations and community impact; Mastercard caps revenue at $1M. The full landscape, including the much larger government programs, is on our women business grants page.
The BOF licence and certification reimbursement is open right now (up to $2,000 a year, rolling). The DoorDash #BlackFoodEnergy grant ($10,220, restaurants and food service) is between rounds, and the Cassels grant (cash plus pro bono legal work) applies only in Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary and has not announced its 2026 cycle.
RBC Rock My Business awards $10,000 to 8 winners a year, but read the gates: your business must be pre-launch or under $25,000 in annual sales, you must complete two free Futurpreneur workshops before applying, and the 2026 cycle closed June 26. The next cycle is expected mid-2027, so the workshops are the thing to do now if this fits you.
Your open-to-everyone options are TELUS #StandWithOwners (closed September 2, 2026; 2027 dates not announced), then the fall wave: Purolator, Meridian (Ontario only) and Pizza Hut's November cycle, then FedEx, Zensurance and Amex when their next windows are announced. Note the tie-ins: FedEx requires a shipment, Zensurance an insurance quote, and Amex requires your business to be incorporated.
Corporate money that is not for businesses at all
Four of the most-searched corporate programs in Canada do not fund private businesses, and listing them as small business grants (as many aggregator sites do) wastes applicants' time. If you searched for these as business grants, here is the honest answer:
- Rogers Youth Grants ($10,000 or $25,000) fund registered charities and community organizations running education or employment programs for youth aged 12 to 29. A for-profit business cannot apply, whatever its youth focus.
- ScotiaRISE ($25,000 to $150,000, rolling) funds registered charities and nonprofits working on economic resilience. It is open now, but only to qualified organizations.
- Bell Let's Talk Community Fund (up to $25,000) funds registered charities delivering mental health services; it is between intakes, with the next window expected around May 2027.
- TELUS Indigenous Communities Fund ($5,000 to $25,000) funds Indigenous-led organizations and nonprofits, with a fall intake running September 10 to October 7, 2026.
Does Rogers have a grant for small businesses?
No. Rogers' national giving program, Rogers Youth Grants, awards $10,000 and $25,000 grants to registered charities and community organizations that run educational or employment programming for youth aged 12 to 29. Private businesses are not eligible, and there is no separate Rogers small business grant program in Canada as of July 2026. If you found Rogers on a list of business grants, the list was wrong, and the same error appears on several aggregator sites. A business owner searching for that kind of corporate cheque should look instead at TELUS #StandWithOwners, which is Rogers' telecom peer running an actual business contest (closed September 2, 2026; 2027 dates not announced), or at the government side, where wage subsidies and hiring programs serve the youth-employment goal that probably prompted the search in the first place.
Amex, FedEx, Purolator, BMO, Desjardins and Rogers small business grants
AmexBetween intakesIncorporated, independent, under $1.5M revenue
FedExBetween intakesA FedEx shipment during the contest
PurolatorBetween intakes50 or fewer employees
BMOBetween intakes51%+ women-owned, 2+ years
Desjardins GoodSparkClosedNo longer a business grant
Desjardins Startup PrizeOpenU of T founders only
RogersBetween intakesCharities only, no businesses
If you run a women-owned business, the women business grants guide puts BMO and Mastercard beside the larger government programs you can apply to.
Small business contest or grant: what you agree to when you enter
Public votesSome winners are picked partly by votes
Your name and storyThe sponsor can publish your win
Purchases and tie-insSome ask you to buy or get a quote
TaxTax is yours to sort out
DecisionsJudged on merit, no appeal
Your real odds, in numbers
Almost no corporate sponsor publishes application counts, so most odds you see quoted are invented. Here is what can actually be sourced, and what it implies:
- CUA (Nova Scotia) is the one program with published math: 27 recipients from 567 applications in 2026, a 4.8% approval rate, in a program restricted to one province. Treat that as the ceiling for what a regional corporate grant pays out.
- National $10,000 contests run well below that. Amex funds 100 businesses a year from a national pool (our catalog estimates 1 to 3%). BMO picks 10 winners nationally (well under 1%). The Amber Grant picks three monthly winners across two countries (under 1%). FedEx picks 16 winners from a customer base of hundreds of thousands.
- The best odds are where the pool is narrowest. Pizza Hut's Equal Slice caps application spots, which our catalog estimates at 5 to 10% overall odds; Purolator's customer-reserved stream (2 of 5 grants plus 13 of 33 finalist spots) has meaningfully better odds than its open stream; Mastercard's women-only, under-$1M-revenue gates thin the field to an estimated few hundred applicants for 10 awards.
The best corporate-grant strategy for most owners is two entries a year: the one open-to-all contest whose window you are in (TELUS #StandWithOwners closed September 2, 2026; 2027 dates not announced), plus the one reserved program you qualify for, chosen because reservation is what moves odds from lottery to plausible. Skip the rest without guilt.
Can I apply to several corporate grants at the same time?
Yes, and nothing stops you from also holding government funding: corporate sponsors do not run stacking rules the way government programs do, because a contest prize is not a contribution agreement. The practical limits are different. Each program allows one entry per business per cycle (Zensurance disqualifies multiple entries outright), several require a fresh entry each cycle rather than rolling your application forward, and the tie-in programs each carry their own cost of entry: a FedEx shipment, a Zensurance insurance quote, Futurpreneur's two workshops, or Amber's $15 USD fee. The real constraint is your time. A strong contest entry is a story worth telling about your business; write that story once, well, and adapt it to the two or three programs whose gates you actually pass, rather than spraying weak entries at all fifteen.
Corporate grants that have ended (stop applying to these)
Two heavily-searched programs are closed, with no announced return. Plenty of listicles still recommend them; do not spend time there.
- Visa She's Next ($10,000 to 20 women entrepreneurs a year, with IFundWomen and YSpace): the application page now states the program is closed, and no future intake has been announced.
- Desjardins GoodSpark ($20,000 to 150 businesses a year at its peak): the specific small business grant format can no longer be confirmed on Desjardins' page, which now describes a community investment fund aimed at organizations. We list it as closed until Desjardins says otherwise.
The list that is 24 times bigger
Here is the number that should reframe your search: for the 15 corporate programs above, our catalog tracks 357 live government grant programs for Canadian businesses, and 185 of them have funding ceilings of $100,000 or more. The typical corporate cheque is $10,000, awarded to a handful of winners once a year. Government programs are larger, criteria-based rather than judged, and many are open year-round. Corporate grants make a nice bonus; the government list is where a funding plan lives.
The map below checks your business against that full list in about two minutes: your province, industry, stage and structure, matched against every live program, with the ones you qualify for ranked first. Free, no account needed.
See every program your business qualifies for
Corporate contests are a handful of $10,000 cheques a year. Answer a few quick questions and watch the map narrow the full government list, 357 live grant programs, to the ones your business can actually get. Free, no account.
When do corporate small business grants open? Month by month
Open on October 16, 2026: the Amber Grant, Zensurance, Meridian (Ontario), Pizza Hut Equal Slice, the BOF licence reimbursement (Black-owned), the Desjardins Startup Prize (U of T) and ScotiaRISE (charities). Month chips below are as of October 16, 2026.
- JanuaryPastCUA Community Investment Grant (Nova Scotia): the 2026 deadline was January 30.
- FebruaryPastOnly the Amber Grant's monthly round, which closes on the last day of every month.
- MarchPastMastercard Small Business Fund: 2026 applications ran March 3 to 24. Rogers Youth Grants (charities only): the 2025 portal opened March 24.
- AprilPastBMO Celebrating Women: the 2026 intake closed April 23. Amex's next cycle is expected around April 2027.
- MayPastAmex Backing Canadian Small Businesses: 2026 closed May 19. Bell Let's Talk Community Fund (charities only): next window expected around May 2027.
- JunePastTELUS #StandWithOwners opened June 2, 2026. Cassels: the 2025 cycle closed June 20, 2025.
- JulyExpectedRBC Rock My Business: the required workshops for the next awards run July 6, 2026 to May 13, 2027.
- AugustPastOnly the Amber Grant's monthly round. FedEx #BackingSmall usually runs in spring or summer; no 2027 dates are published.
- SeptemberPastTELUS #StandWithOwners closed September 2, 2026. Purolator: 2025 nominations ran September 10 to November 5. The TELUS Indigenous Communities Fund (nonprofits): fall 2026 intake ran September 10 to October 7.
- OctoberOpen nowDesjardins Startup Prize (U of T founders): applications October 13 to November 18, 2026. Meridian Small Business Big Impact Awards (Ontario): nominations open until November 30, 2026.
- NovemberOpen nowPizza Hut Equal Slice: the national pitch competition is November 24, 2026, and applications close when spots fill.
- DecemberOpen nowZensurance Small Business Grant: the current round closes December 18, 2026. Amber names its three year-end winners in December.
Most sponsors announce a window only weeks before it opens. Get an email when the next corporate intake opens →
FAQ
What is a corporate small business grant?
Which corporate grants are open right now?
Is the Amber Grant available to Canadian businesses?
Does Rogers offer small business grants?
Do I have to buy something to enter these contests?
What happened to Visa She's Next and Desjardins GoodSpark?
Are corporate grants better than government grants?
Sources and official references
Program rows on this page trace to GrantCompass catalog records, each maintained against the sponsor's official pages. Key primary sources:
- Amber Grants for Women, WomensNet
- TELUS #StandWithOwners, TELUS
- Backing Canadian Small Businesses, American Express Canada and DMZ at Toronto Metropolitan University
- Black Opportunity Fund funding programs (licence reimbursement and DoorDash #BlackFoodEnergy)
- BMO Celebrating Women Grant Program, BMO Financial Group
- Rock My Business and RBC Start-Up Awards, Futurpreneur Canada
- Purolator True North Small Business Grant Contest, Purolator
- Rogers Youth Grants, Rogers Communications
- Zensurance Small Business Grant, Zensurance
- Pizza Hut Equal Slice Grant Program, Startup Canada
Get told when the next intake opens
Amex, BMO, Mastercard, Purolator and the rest announce their windows just weeks before they open, and most close within a month. Join the list and we'll flag corporate intakes, plus the larger government programs your business qualifies for, as they open.
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