From 9wsyr.com

Syracuse (WSYR-TV) - While Wall Street rallies, small businesses struggle to borrow money.
According to the National Small Business Association, nearly 40 percent of business owners surveyed in the past few weeks say they weren't able to get financing to run their companies.
Because of that, business owners are turning to other avenues.
"Funding has been an absolute nightmare," says Wendy Cobrda, who owns Earthsense.
And starting up Earthsense has cost a lot more money than Cobrda could have imagined. They got a credit card loan from Bank of America -- but it wasn't enough.
"Yes, there was the initial investment from our pocket and friends and family ... You also have sweat equity to put into the company," Cobrda says.
The issue is Earthsense is what they call an intellectual property; they do research to determine what it means to be green, and what people expect from companies.
"Product by product, people are defining green differently," says Cobrda.
It may sound like an abstract concept, but it's anything but: Research is concrete once companies use it. But to get financing, you have to prove the investment will pay off.
Folks with the Tech Garden meet with new businesses to help them figure out how to get funding - and bank financing isn't even on the list.
Instead, the Tech Garden goes right to angel investors or venture capitalists.
"Without a track record or revenue stream, you have to have a good concept these angel investors might be interested in," says Tech Garden vice president Paul Brooks.
Only one of every 20 or 30 businesses get lucky; Earthsense was one of them. Cobrda's waiting now on the deal to go through.
Despite the stimulus money available to green projects, it's earmarked for shovel-ready construction projects only.
Even though Earthsense does the research needed to determine the viability of a "green" project, it doesn't get a piece of the funding.