black lentilSearchFor small business owners
Guides and free workbooks on cash flow, pricing, customers, and managing a small business.
Featured guide · Cash flow explained
Sales, profit, and available cash move at different times. Find the week when the business may need to act.
Illustrative example · cash balance and minimum target
Browse by topic
Each collection connects the explanation, an example and the next useful step. Follow a reading path or explore the full topic.
Read, then put it to work
Understand why cash gets tight, decide what to keep available, then build a weekly forecast.
Test an offer, understand what acquiring a customer costs, and keep a record of what you learn.
Set decision limits, investigate inconsistent service, and organize the weekly review.
In this edition
Connect your household needs with the business’s upcoming commitments, and distinguish the amount you can fund from the correct way to pay it.
Compare usable quantities, delivery, preparation and payment terms before treating a lower quote as a saving.
Find where work waits, compare the demands of different jobs and decide what you can promise without disappointing existing customers.
Common questions
Learn and prepare
Income, expenses, owner pay, estimated payments and hiring—explained with examples and links to the rules.
Selected federal deadlines and suggested reviews, with the work to prepare and the source to check. September 2026–January 2027.
A preparation checklist and four working pages for records, payment planning and your preparer handoff.
Working file · Free
The 13-week workbook connects expected customer receipts with payroll, rent, purchasing, debt, taxes, and other required payments. It includes a blank forecast and a completed example.
No account required. Enter amounts supported by your records or clearly identified estimates. Use zero only when you have confirmed that no money is expected; a blank means it still needs checking.All three example weeks are shown below. The full workbook includes all 13 weeks.
| 13-week cash | Week 1 | Week 4 | Week 5 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Opening cash | $42,000 | $36,000 | $1,000 |
| Customer receipts | $18,000 | $6,000 | $48,000 |
| Required payments | $18,000 | $41,000 | $19,000 |
| Cash above target | $22,000 | -$19,000 | $10,000 |
Economic reports
Federal Reserve · Checked September 20, 2026
The federal funds target is now 3.75% to 4.00%. A business loan still depends on its own benchmark, margin, terms, and risk.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics · Checked September 20, 2026
The national consumer index is context. Pricing decisions still require the business’s own invoices, usage, payroll, and margins.
U.S. Census Bureau · Checked September 20, 2026
The Census revenue index is 41.9 and its current input-price index is 69.4 for data through September 6.
From Black Lentil · Editorial
Handing over tasks still leaves you with the decisions unless people know what they can approve, the limits and the information they need.
Choose a decision that repeatedly comes back to you. Agree on who can make it, the result they are responsible for, the limits, the information and records needed, when to ask for help and how you will review what happened.
Read the editorialExplore cash flow, pricing, borrowing, customers, managing people and choosing software.
How Black Lentil helps
A business decision affects more than one part of the business. A higher price changes what you earn and what customers expect. Growth brings sales, expenses and more work to organize. Our guides connect these choices, with explanations, examples and working files you can use with your own records.
Cash and commitments
A busy month can still leave you short of cash if customers pay after rent, payroll and suppliers are due. Put expected receipts and payments on a weekly timeline. Mark uncertain amounts and dates, then look for gaps while you still have time to act.
Understand where the cash goesPrices and costs
Start with what each sale leaves after its direct costs. Compare the current and proposed price, including discounts and fees, then work out how fewer sales would affect the result. That calculation gives you a starting point; customer response and the cost of running the business still matter.
Work through a price changeCustomers and demand
People may like an idea without becoming customers. Ask how they handle the problem today, what it costs them and what they have already tried. Follow what happens next: a conversation, a paid trial, a purchase or a return visit. Each tells you something different about demand.
Find out what customer interest meansManaging people
A supplier raises a price and an order is waiting. Agree on what the manager can approve, the spending limit, the information to check and when to ask you. Keep a record of the decision so you can review the result together.
Set clear limits for a managerChoosing software
Before setting up purchase approvals, agree on who can approve an order, how much they can spend and who covers an absence. Then check whether the software supports those decisions. If it cannot, compare changes to the setup, connections to other tools or a replacement.
Understand why a new tool may not helpDay-to-day operations
A customer gets a clear answer one day and three different answers the next. The cause could be missing information, training, staffing or a promise the business could not keep. Follow one real experience to understand what changed before adding another rule.
Understand inconsistent serviceStart with the question that matters to you now. Work through the explanation, use your own numbers or records, and decide what to try. Then check what changed for your money, your customers and the people doing the work.
The situations above are teaching examples, not customer case studies. The linked articles explain the choices, limits and steps in more detail.
Behind the articles
George brings restaurant-business experience to Black Lentil. Our articles identify their writers, distinguish teaching examples from real business stories, and link to sources for factual claims.
About Black Lentil and how to read our articles