I've been in small business lending since 2008. This is the number that keeps me up at night.
I started Fora Financial in 2008. Not a great year to start a lending company.
The financial system had just seized up. Banks weren't lending to small businesses. They were barely lending to each other. The business owners I was talking to weren't asking for much. They had customers, they had revenue, they had plans. They just couldn't get capital from anyone who was supposed to give it to them.
That's the gap we were built to fill. Faster decisions, less bureaucracy, money in the hands of people who would actually use it to build something.
Eighteen years later, we've deployed over $5 billion to more than 55,000 businesses. The gap we set out to fill is smaller than it used to be. That's good news.
But one number from our 2026 Business Insights Report has been sitting with me in a way that I can't shake. We surveyed over 300 business owners who had applied for funding to understand how they're thinking about capital, growth, and what they need from a lender.
50% of small business owners agree that financial institutions are evolving to meet their needs.
Half.
After eighteen years of fintech growth, alternative lending, online applications, and billions of dollars of investment in the space, half of small business owners think the industry is keeping pace with what they actually need.
The other half don't.
That's the number that keeps me up at night. And I think it's worth being honest about why.
The industry has an unresolved trust problem.
Speed was always the pitch for alternative lenders. Faster than a bank. Less paperwork. Approval in hours instead of weeks. That was real, and it mattered. It still does.
But the data tells me that speed alone isn't closing the gap anymore.
We asked business owners what matters most when choosing a financing partner. Transparent pricing came in first. 71% rated it “extremely important.” Prepayment flexibility without penalties came in second at 67%. Both of those were new questions this year. Both outranked speed to fund. Both outranked simple application process.
And here's the shift that tells the story underneath those numbers: the share of business owners who said “assessing speed and ease” was a key factor in choosing a lender fell 14 points year-over-year. Speed is expected now. It's not a differentiator. It's table stakes.
What business owners are actually evaluating is whether you'll be straight with them about what it costs.
Let me show you what I mean.
We asked an open-ended question in this year's survey: what could financial institutions do differently to better serve your business needs?
Here are three of the responses that came back.
“Online loans become a noose, not an opportunity.”
“They don't see you as a business or a person. They only see a rigid algorithm.”
“Transparency on pricing. More education to ensure customers fully understand interest rates, payment scenarios.”
These aren't hypothetical complaints. These are business owners who have actively sought financing, speaking from direct experience navigating the lending landscape. They're not talking about one lender. They're talking about an industry.
What they want is not complicated. They want to know exactly what they're paying before they sign. They want repayment terms that align with how their cash flow actually works, not a fixed schedule built around the lender's convenience. They want to be evaluated as a business, not run through a model and handed a number.
The cost-related complaints in our data moved sharply this year. High interest rates or fees as a funding challenge jumped 13 points year-over-year. Unfavorable repayment terms rose 5 points. Those two issues now dwarf every other friction point in the process.
That's not a macroeconomic complaint. That's a product complaint. And it's aimed directly at the industry I've spent my career in.
Business owners stopped trusting the relationship. Not the lender.
One more data point that I think gets misread.
Preference for a long-term relationship with a lender fell 18 points year-over-year. Interest in a strategic partnership dropped 14 points. I've seen people interpret this as business owners wanting less from their lenders.
I don't think that's it.
72% of business owners said they want more than capital from a financing partner. Cash flow management tools, business growth consulting, financial planning. Only 28% said capital alone is sufficient.
What fell wasn't the desire for a good relationship. What fell was the assumption that a long-standing relationship is a fair one. Across the industry, the accumulated experience of unclear terms, rigid repayment structures, and processes that prioritize the lender over the borrower has eroded that assumption. Business owners evaluate every interaction on its own terms now.
Transparent communication rose 12 points. Quick, efficient process held at #1 for the second straight year. The ask is still for a great experience. The tolerance for assuming it will happen has dropped.
That's a higher standard. And it's the right one.
One more thing worth paying attention to.
39% of the business owners in the survey are already using AI tools. That number on its own is notable. What's more notable is what sits underneath it.
Businesses expecting significant revenue growth are more than three times as likely to already be using AI as businesses expecting a decline. 56% versus 17%.
I want to be precise: that's correlation, not causation. High-growth businesses have more resources. They invest in more things. The data doesn't prove AI drives growth.
What it does show is that adoption and growth expectations are moving together. The businesses sitting out are not keeping pace with the ones leaning in. And unlike most variables a business owner can't control (tariff policy, interest rates, a competitor opening up the street), this one is a decision.
73% of business owners say tariffs are impacting their operations. 76% still expect revenue growth this year.
I've watched small business owners navigate every version of a difficult environment for nearly two decades. The consistency in that optimism number isn't surprising to me. These are people who built something. They know how to adapt. They don't need favorable conditions. They need capital and clarity.
What I take from all of this.
The opportunity in alternative lending has never been about being faster than a bank. It's always been about being better. Faster was a start. Transparent pricing, flexible repayment, honest communication. That's where better actually lives.
The fact that 50% of business owners think financial institutions are keeping pace is not a passing grade. It's a reminder that there's still a real gap between what this industry promises and what business owners experience.
At Fora Financial, this data shapes how we think about our own work. Eighteen years and $5 billion in, we know the gap between what business owners need and what this industry delivers is real. The standard we're holding ourselves to is the one business owners named directly: transparent pricing before you sign, repayment terms that fit how your business actually operates, and communication that treats you like a person building something. We don't think the work is ever finished. But we know exactly what we're building toward.
The full 2026 Business Insights Report is free at forafinancial.com/business-insights. The lender expectations section is the one worth reading twice.
Since 2008, Fora Financial has distributed $5 billion to 55,000 businesses. Click here or call (877) 419-3568 for more information on how Fora Financial's working capital solutions can help your business thrive.
