Terms of Service

1. What the Service is — and what it is not

FirstBearing is a business-education and planning tool. It builds a step-by-step roadmap for starting and growing a small business, points you to official government resources, generates documents and plans from the answers you give us, and gives you research and guidance about customers, pricing, licensing, and funding.

We are not a law firm, accounting firm, tax preparer, bank, lender, broker, or investment adviser, and we do not provide legal, tax, accounting, or investment advice. Nothing in the Service — including documents, checklists, and AI-generated content — is a substitute for advice from a licensed professional about your specific situation. You are responsible for every filing, registration, payment, contract, and business decision you make. See our Disclosures and Trust Center.

We do not file anything with any government on your behalf. We do not guarantee that you will form a business, get a license, get funding or a loan or grant, get customers, make money, or stay compliant with any law.

2. Eligibility and your account

You must be at least 18 and able to form a binding contract. You must give accurate information and keep it current. You are responsible for activity under your account and for keeping your password secure. Tell us promptly at support@firstbearing.org if you suspect unauthorized use. One person or business entity per account unless we agree otherwise in writing.

3. Membership, billing, and renewal

• The Service is sold as a subscription for $20 per month (plus any tax), billed in advance to your payment method through our payment processor, Stripe. Prices may change on renewal with at least 14 days' notice to the email on your account.
• Free to build, no credit card: new accounts get full access to the Service at no cost and without providing a payment method while building their plan or their acquisition baseline. Once that is delivered, continuing to the rest of the Service (the guided roadmap, ongoing Growth Brain, and other paid features) requires a subscription; the plan or baseline itself remains yours to view at no cost. As a backstop, an account that has not reached that point within 7 days also loses access to the rest of the app at that time. Nothing is ever charged during this period or when it ends without a payment method on file. Your data is retained; a completed plan or acquisition baseline remains viewable, and subscribing restores access to the rest of your saved work. This free period is available once per person.
• Subscribing. If you choose to subscribe, you provide a payment method at checkout and are charged $20 (plus any tax) immediately, and your membership then renews automatically each month until you cancel. By subscribing you authorize us (through Stripe) to charge the fee to your payment method on each renewal date.
• You can cancel anytime from your billing settings or by emailing support@firstbearing.org. Cancellation stops future charges. Your access continues until the end of the billing period you already paid for.
• 14-day money-back guarantee: if you email support@firstbearing.org within 14 days of your first charge and ask for a refund, we will refund that first payment in full. This applies once, to your first paid month only.
• Other refunds: after the guarantee window, and for renewal charges, payments are generally non-refundable, and we do not provide prorated refunds for the unused part of a billing period. If you were charged in error, charged after a timely cancellation, or something clearly went wrong, contact support@firstbearing.org within 30 days and we'll review it in good faith and make it right where appropriate. This does not limit rights you may have under the law of your state.
• If a payment fails, we may retry it and may suspend the Service until it clears. You're responsible for any charges you incur.
• Advertising spend is separate. If you choose to run ads, you pay the ad platform (e.g. Google) directly for media, and you set and control your own budget. We do not front or take a share of ad spend, and your ad accounts and results are yours.

4. Acceptable use

You agree not to:

• use the Service for anything illegal, fraudulent, or deceptive, or to start or run an unlawful business;
• resell, sublicense, or repackage the Service or its output as your own product, or use it to build a competing service;
• scrape, bulk-download, reverse engineer, or try to extract our source code, prompts, models, or databases;
• upload malware, break or probe our security, or interfere with other users or our infrastructure;
• impersonate anyone, or submit reviews or content that are fake, paid-for, or not your genuine experience;
• use automated systems to access the Service beyond normal personal use, or exceed rate limits.

We may suspend or close accounts that violate this section or create risk for us or other users.

5. Your content and the documents we generate

You keep ownership of the information and materials you put into the Service (“Your Content”). You grant us a license to store, process, and use Your Content to operate and improve the Service and to provide support. You confirm you have the right to share what you upload.

Documents, plans, roadmaps, and other output the Service generates for you (“Deliverables”) are yours to use for your own business. Deliverables are built from templates and automated systems, are provided “as is,” are not legal or tax advice, and should be reviewed by a licensed professional before you rely on or sign them. We may reuse the underlying templates and generation systems for other customers.

6. Reviews you submit

If you submit a review or testimonial, you confirm it reflects your genuine experience and that you were not paid or otherwise compensated for it. You grant us a perpetual, worldwide, royalty-free license to publish, edit for length or clarity, display, and use it (with the name and location you provided) on our site and in marketing. We review submissions before publishing and may decline or remove any review. You can ask us to remove your published review by emailing support@firstbearing.org.

7. Our intellectual property

The Service, including its software, content, templates, prompts, design, and the FirstBearing name and logo, is owned by FirstBearing LLC or its licensors and is protected by law. We grant you a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable license to use the Service for your own business while your membership is active. All rights not expressly granted are reserved.

8. Third-party services and links

The Service relies on third parties (for example Stripe for payments, and AI providers for generated content) and links to government and other third-party websites. We don't control those services or sites and are not responsible for them. Your use of them is governed by their own terms.

9. Disclaimers

THE SERVICE AND ALL DELIVERABLES ARE PROVIDED “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE,” WITHOUT WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, ACCURACY, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT. We do not warrant that the Service will be uninterrupted or error-free, that information or AI-generated content is accurate, current, or complete, or that following the Service will produce any particular result, including legal compliance, funding, or customers. Laws, fees, forms, and government processes change and vary by location; you must confirm anything important on the relevant official source.

10. Limitation of liability

TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, FIRSTBEARING LLC AND ITS OWNERS, EMPLOYEES, AND SUPPLIERS WILL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, CONSEQUENTIAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, OR FOR LOST PROFITS, LOST BUSINESS, LOST DATA, OR GOVERNMENT PENALTIES OR FEES, ARISING FROM OR RELATED TO THE SERVICE. OUR TOTAL LIABILITY FOR ALL CLAIMS RELATING TO THE SERVICE IN ANY 12-MONTH PERIOD WILL NOT EXCEED THE GREATER OF (A) THE AMOUNT YOU PAID US IN THAT PERIOD OR (B) $100. Some states don't allow certain limitations, so parts of this section may not apply to you.

11. Indemnification

You agree to indemnify and hold FirstBearing LLC harmless from claims, losses, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising from your use of the Service, Your Content, your business, or your breach of these Terms.

12. Termination

You can stop using the Service and close your account anytime. We may suspend or terminate your access if you breach these Terms, if required by law, or if we stop offering the Service. On termination, your right to use the Service ends. You can request an export of Your Content before closing your account; after closure we retain and delete data as described in the Privacy Policy. Sections that by their nature should survive (payment owed, IP, disclaimers, liability limits, indemnification, dispute terms) survive termination.

13. Changes to the Service or these Terms

We may change the Service and these Terms. If we make a material change to the Terms, we'll post the new version with a new date and, where reasonable, notify you by email or in the app. Changes take effect when posted (or on the stated date). Continuing to use the Service after that means you accept the new Terms.

14. Governing law and disputes

These Terms are governed by the laws of the State of Colorado, without regard to conflict-of-laws rules. Before filing anything, you agree to first contact us at support@firstbearing.org and try in good faith to resolve the dispute for 30 days. Any dispute that isn't resolved will be brought exclusively in the state or federal courts located in Colorado, and you and we consent to their jurisdiction. Each party waives any right to a jury trial and agrees that claims must be brought individually, not as part of a class or representative action, to the extent permitted by law. Nothing here prevents either party from seeking relief in small-claims court.

15. Miscellaneous

These Terms and the Privacy Policy are the entire agreement between you and us about the Service. If a provision is unenforceable, the rest stays in effect. Our not enforcing a right isn't a waiver. You may not assign these Terms; we may assign them to a successor (for example in a sale of the business). There are no third-party beneficiaries.

16. Contact

FirstBearing LLC
support@firstbearing.org