Split into ten $10,000 ad campaigns for metro Detroit businesses
Beasley Media Group Detroit, in partnership with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, launched a $100,000 grant program that most small business owners can actually win. There is no pitch deck, no revenue floor, no matching funds. The program awards ten metro Detroit small businesses a $10,000 professional advertising campaign each, running across Beasley's five Detroit stations and their digital platforms through the fall.
Read that again, because the prize is the part people underrate. This is not a check that disappears into payroll. It is airtime on 101.1 WRIF, 94.7 WCSX, 105.1 The Bounce, 105.9 KISS-FM and the Praise Network, plus digital, the kind of exposure a Detroit small business could almost never afford to buy outright. For a shop, a service, or a young brand still fighting to be known, visibility is the wall. This program pays to knock it down.
"Attention is the one thing a small business cannot manufacture on its own. This program is handing it out for the price of an essay."
The catch, if you can call it that, is small. Applicants submit a 300 word essay about their business and how it has a positive effect on the community. That is the whole bar. No formal financials, no long form grant narrative, just a clear story about what you do and why it matters to the block you serve. The program is open to small and medium businesses across Metro Detroit and Southeast Michigan.
Here is the FOMO that should move you: the applications opened July 6 and close August 31, with winners announced in September. That is a short runway. And 300 words is exactly the kind of task that feels easy enough to keep pushing to tomorrow until the window is gone. The people who win this will be the ones who wrote the essay the night they heard about it.
The details
The Program
$100,000 total · 10 winners
The 2026 Beasley Detroit Small Business Grant Program, run with the MEDC, awards ten metro Detroit businesses a $10,000 advertising campaign each across Beasley's Detroit radio stations and digital platforms, running through fall 2026.
Who Can Apply
Metro Detroit · Southeast Michigan
Small and medium sized businesses located in Metro Detroit and Southeast Michigan. No revenue minimum or industry restriction listed, so most owners in the region qualify.
How To Apply
Deadline: August 31, 2026
Submit a 300 word essay about your business and how it positively affects your community. Apply at kissfmdetroit.com/grant. Applications are accepted through August 31, with winners selected in September.
If you want the checklist: confirm your business is in the Metro Detroit or Southeast Michigan footprint, draft the 300 words around a specific community impact rather than a generic mission statement, and submit at kissfmdetroit.com/grant before August 31. Keep the essay concrete. A judge reading dozens of entries remembers the bakery that feeds a shelter every Friday, not the business that says it "gives back."
"The winners of this will not be the biggest businesses. They will be the ones that told the truest story in 300 words."
This is the version of opportunity ANF pays attention to. Not the coastal mega-round, but a regional media company and the state putting real reach behind small owners who build where they live. The prize is not cash you can hide in a spreadsheet. It is your name, on the air, in front of the whole city, the moment you were never going to reach on your own budget.
The window closes August 31. Whether your business is one of the ten is 300 words away.