Importance of Business Insurance

If you have recently gone into business, your view of insurance may be that it is a luxury that big, thriving companies can afford to purchase but something you can't worry about right now. After all, you have tight cash flows, you have employees (or at least yourself) to pay, and you need to market your product. So you may be thinking, "If I get robbed or my old truck gets stolen, I'll deal with it then. I'd rather spend money dealing with what I know will happen, rather than what could happen."

To some degree this attitude is not such a bad thing. Many small businesses have starved themselves for cash by paying insurance premiums to insulate against casualty losses that never happened.

Protection From Legal Hazards

We'd like to get you out of the mode of thinking of insurance as only protection against casualties. In fact, the most important reason you may need insurance is for protection from legal hazards. In any event, if you understand how insurance is important to your business, you will be in a better position to determine the types of insurance you need and to determine how much insurance you need.

The economic connection between the owner of a small business and the business itself is obvious. Because of this connection, any large, uninsured loss that hits either of the following may threaten the continued operation of the business and threaten the owner's financial well-being:

• the business itself
• the business owner or owner's personal property