Small Business Resources

St. Louis County Library has databases to help you start and grow a business, and we provide free training to help individuals or groups learn to use these databases. Complete the Book A Librarian form to request training. Our databases can help you:

Access legal forms

Search Gale Legal Forms for the legal forms you’ll need to start and run a business.

Analyze competitors

Learn about your competitors’ locations, executives, sales volume and expenses using Reference Solutions and Mergent Intellect.

Create mailing lists

Reference Solutions and Mergent Intellect allow you to create free mailing lists containing names and addresses of potential residential and business clients.

Determine potential

First Research and Gale Business: Insights provide industry reports, risk assessments, forecasts for growth, opportunities, trends, challenges, critical issues, executive insights and more to help you decide if a business is worth starting.

Discover market demand and size

DemographicsNow and Reference Solutions will help you determine the market demand and size for your product or service.

Explore grants

Find current statistics and five year forecasts to support a grant application using DemographicsNow. Discover grant funding opportunities, 990s and the efforts a foundation has previously funded using Foundations Directory Online.

Find potential clients

Find businesses or people most likely to purchase your product or service using Reference Solutions, DemographicsNow and Mergent Intellect. Discover people and businesses new to your area using Reference Solutions. Learn about a company’s executives, locations, sales volume and more using Reference Solutions and Mergent Intellect.

Learn to run a business

Take free courses to learn how to start and run a business through LinkedIn Learning and Gale Courses.

Locate a business

Use DemographicsNow to discover competitor locations, population forecasts, highest traffic areas and the vicinities where a product or service is in highest demand. Search for companies like yours that have gone out of business in a particular area using Reference Solutions and Mergent Intellect.

Write a business plan

Create a business plan step by step with Gale Business: Plan Builder. Access over 600 sample business plans in Small Business Resource Center. Find statistical information needed for your business plan in First Research, DemographicsNow, Reference Solutions and Mergent Intellect.

Local organizations supporting startups

See the full list of organizations