Bhakti Chai taps crowdfunding lenders for $250,000 credit line

BOULDER – Boulder-based tea company Bhakti Chai LLC turned to an alternative source for its latest infusion of cash, a $250,000 crowd-funded line of credit through Denver startup P2Binvestor Inc.

The P2Binvestor model is a way for small, growing companies to obtain working capital when such funding is inaccessible or unaffordable to them through conventional banks.

Bhakti Chai Chief Executive Brook Eddy said Monday that her company expects revenue to hit $6 million this year, up 58 percent from last year’s mark of $3.8 million. With such rapid growth, Eddy said the business can sometimes bounce back and forth from month to month between profit and loss. Many conventional banks, however, wanted to see years-worth of consecutive profits.

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Bhakti Chai raised about $800,000 during a pair of equity funding rounds last year, one through a CircleUp crowdfunding campaign and another through local angel investors. Eddy said another equity funding round is likely, maybe as soon as next year. But she said for now the company just needs a way to help with cash flow on certain months, and she was looking for other avenues to bridge the gap.

“(Another funding round is) probably going to need to occur but this is really just to get us through and get access to (the line of credit),” Eddy said.

P2Binvestor is a crowdfunding platform that underwrites working capital loans to growing companies. Once the loan agreement is signed, P2Bi offers its crowd of more than 350 accredited investors the chance to fund the loan. P2Bi takes a cut of the interest paid by the borrower.

Bhakti Chai was founded in 2007, with a headquarters in downtown Boulder and a facility in Longmont where its teas are brewed. Eddy said that as new retailers and customers are added rapidly, sometimes it takes three to four months to start seeing payments from the new accounts.

“Order growth creates significant up-front costs that can take months to recoup, and P2Binvestor’s financing helps us manage cash flow and continue our robust growth strategy,” Eddy said.