The Homework,
Done in Public

The spine of the whole fund. Canada's community lenders have run this exact play for 30 years. One honesty condition: the people pledging money must be told they are cushioning the risk, because the businesses banks decline are riskier than bank customers. Nothing about it is free, and it will never be marketed as free.

Correct, and it quietly powers everything else. Two $58K salaries are 8.8% of sales at an average restaurant and 2.3% at a $5M one. Affordability is a size question before it is a financing question.

Closed for good, and the reason is worth knowing: at a small business, profit is whatever the owner's accountant says it is. A century of profit-share banking worldwide ended up avoiding profit-share for exactly this reason. Replaced with a capped share of sales, which can be verified, for larger businesses.

As a funding source it cannot be policed, and at average restaurants the owner's pay is already near the floor. What survives: training staff to carry management duties becomes a written promise in the loan, because businesses with real management depth are simply better borrowers.

The Rescue Door

For small operators trapped in an expensive advance. The fund pays it off; the freed-up money, $15K to $30K a year, funds the starter commitments. The moral core of the whole idea, and the riskiest lending, so it leans on the safety cushion.

The Growth Door

For the average restaurant. Normal-rate loans with a two-year patient start, earned by keeping the core commitments. The fund also does the government-grant paperwork most small operators never claim, and requires the scheduling practices that pay for themselves.

The Scale Door

For $3M+ operators: repayment as a capped share of sales, the full commitment list including reduced hours, and later, a path to employee ownership, where the 4-day week finally becomes the employees' own choice to make.

What if a business hires two more people?

At an average restaurant it flips the year from a $49K profit to a small loss. At a strong brand it is easily absorbed. Same two hires, opposite outcomes, which is why no single rule can apply to every business. Try it yourself in the demo above.

What does two Fridays off a month take?

About one extra part-time hire to cover the lost shifts, roughly $26K to $33K a year. Heavy for an average spot, carryable for a big brand, and Fridays are busy days. It deserves a real-world test, not a guess.

And a full 4-day week at 5-day pay?

Two to three extra hires, $45K to $80K a year, more than an average restaurant makes. A cheaper loan cannot carry that alone. Bigger levers, like profit-sharing deals and choosing bigger businesses, were round 3's test.

The two official measures disagree with each other by a factor of two, and the answer changes the 4-day-week cost by 3 to 4 times. It will be settled with government data and pilot locations, not by asking owners for their books.

The fund's most important door refinances businesses trapped in expensive daily-repayment advances. Nobody publishes how often such businesses go on to repay a fair loan, and that single number decides whether the whole design works. It will come from careful pilot lending, not from a benchmark.

Condo management and hot tub dealers came back with the weakest numbers of the six new industries: fees, staffing ratios, and salaries there are still estimates. They stay clearly labelled until trade associations and government data confirm them, and none of them reach fund marketing before that.

The staff turnover rate, the cost of replacing one worker, and food profit margins still lean on US research or careful assumptions. Canadian sources are the next fill, and no number reaches fund marketing before its Canadian version exists.

Provincial rules on overtime, minimum shifts, and equal pay for equal work need a lawyer's eyes before any commitment becomes a signed promise.