LINCOLN PARK — A Lincoln Park doggy day care center is looking to the community to help fund a $20,000 loan for a second location.
Jorge Segovia opened Happy Hounds four years ago to provide an alternative to the larger scale day care centers.
He has been trying to expand to a second location for about a year and has had no luck with banks.
Banks "are nuts. It's crazy," Segovia said. "When we started having problems with the economy, the banks, to give you a loan, they want a kidney and an eye from you."
Paul Biasco talks to DNAinfo Radio to talk about Happy Hounds' fundraising efforts:
Segovia instead is running a campaign through Chicago-based LendSquare, a crowdfunding platform that lets community members and small investors finance small-business loans.
"We are trying to take the next step," Segovia said.
The current Happy Hounds is in a storefront at 2521 N. Lincoln Ave.
Segovia is a certified trainer and groomer and is finishing his certification for animal CPR. Before he opened Happy Hounds he was an engineer at Nestle.
While working at Nestle, he was taking a vacation and found out one of his dogs had been attacked while staying at a dog hotel.
Segovia decided to make a difference for animals and began volunteering at rescue organizations and providing free dog-training courses.
"Normally these kinds of day cares, they are big. They have a lot of dogs, so there is more quantity than quality," Segovia said. "When you forget about quality it's just a mess."
For the second location of Happy Hounds, Segovia is considering the Gold Coast, Bucktown, Lincoln Park and Wrigleyville.
As of Monday afternoon, he had raised $1,600 of the $20,000 through the LendSquare platform.
Investors in the company would be repaid over a two-year period at an interest rate set by an auction process.
Individual investors set a rate they would be willing to accept, and if the campaign reaches the $20,000 goal, the highest rate entered becomes the set interest.
"We are always trying to give the business the best possible deal," said Jose Valdes, who co-founded LendSquare with Sebastian Villarreal in 2012. "You are paying back your customers rather than paying the bank."
LendSquare has helped seven businesses obtain crowdfunded loans ranging from a $7,000 loan to Hyde Park-based Open Produce to a $200,000 loan to Bow Truss coffee roasters.
“People who invest in the business feel like they are part of the business," Valdes said. “It’s a very nice cycle, and the money stays in the community.”