Week 14 · Business Case Workshop

Week 14 Business Case Workshop: Financing a Greenhouse for a Plant Nursery

Introduction to Business Free sample edition

Part 1 — The Big Picture

This week you laid out the coffee cart's choice for a second cart: a loan that costs 1,600 dollars of interest a year and lifts debt-to-equity from 0.75 to 2.0, or a 25 percent share that costs no interest but leaves the owner 75 percent of every future profit. In this workshop you do the same for a different business, an illustrative plant nursery that wants a 40,000-dollar greenhouse. You check that its balance sheet balances, price the loan, find the owners' share under the investor's offer, read debt-to-equity before and after each offer, and then make a real decision: which offer should the owners take, once you weigh the people the choice touches and the strongest case against your choice? Finally, you check a chatbot's analysis of the same case and correct it by hand.

Time budget: Plan for about 90 minutes.

Part 2 — The Task

Guiding question: What does each offer cost the nursery in interest, ownership, and debt-to-equity, and which offer should the owners take once you weigh the people the choice touches and the strongest case for the other offer?

Workshop data: An illustrative plant nursery's year-end balance sheet and two financing offers

Source: The six year-end balance-sheet lines, last year's revenue and net income, and two financing offers for a greenhouse at an illustrative plant nursery, written for this workshop and printed in full in Part 4; it is not real data and describes no real business, place, or person.

Rows: six balance-sheet lines and two offers; the balance-sheet table in Part 4 has 9 rows (six lines and three totals), the offers table has 3 rows, and the people table has 2 rows
Columns: the line and its amount in the balance-sheet table; the situation, interest a year, owners' share, total liabilities, owners' equity, and debt-to-equity in the offers table; the offer, who gains, who gives something up, and what would change your choice in the people table
Decision: whether the owners should borrow 40,000 dollars at 7.5 percent a year or sell a 40 percent share for 40,000 dollars to pay for a greenhouse

Part 3 — Materials & Procedure

Tools and materials

A free spreadsheet (Google Sheets, or any free spreadsheet) for every computation; the SBA's free planning pages and SCORE's free templates for the plan; the SEC's EDGAR full-text search and investor.gov for what a real filing and a real security are; Census, BEA, and BLS data tables for real figures; and one approved chatbot used as a pair consultant whose numbers the student recomputes before trusting them

Ways of working

analyze-the-case
run-the-numbers
recommend-and-defend

Procedure

Open a blank sheet in a free spreadsheet. In A1 to A5 type Cash, Inventory, Greenhouse equipment, Accounts payable, and Bank loan; in B1 to B5 type 9000, 11000, 40000, 5000, and 15000. In A6 type Owners' equity and in B6 type 40000. Tool: A free spreadsheet (Google Sheets, or any free spreadsheet) for every computation; the SBA's free planning pages and SCORE's free templates for the plan; the SEC's EDGAR full-text search and investor.gov for what a real filing and a real security are; Census, BEA, and BLS data tables for real figures; and one approved chatbot used as a pair consultant whose numbers the student recomputes before trusting them. Check: Rows 1 to 6 hold the nursery's six balance-sheet lines as of its year-end.
In A7 type Total assets and in B7 type =B1+B2+B3. In A8 type Total liabilities and in B8 type =B4+B5. In A9 type Liabilities plus owners' equity and in B9 type =B8+B6. Compare B7 with B9 and copy the three totals into the balance-sheet table in Part 4. Tool: A free spreadsheet (Google Sheets, or any free spreadsheet) for every computation; the SBA's free planning pages and SCORE's free templates for the plan; the SEC's EDGAR full-text search and investor.gov for what a real filing and a real security are; Census, BEA, and BLS data tables for real figures; and one approved chatbot used as a pair consultant whose numbers the student recomputes before trusting them. Check: B7 and B9 show the same total, so the balance sheet balances.
In A10 type New money needed and in B10 type 40000; in A11 type Loan rate and in B11 type 0.075; in A12 type Investor's share and in B12 type 40. In A13 type Interest a year and in B13 type =B10*B11. In A14 type Owners' share with the investor and in B14 type =100-B12. Tool: A free spreadsheet (Google Sheets, or any free spreadsheet) for every computation; the SBA's free planning pages and SCORE's free templates for the plan; the SEC's EDGAR full-text search and investor.gov for what a real filing and a real security are; Census, BEA, and BLS data tables for real figures; and one approved chatbot used as a pair consultant whose numbers the student recomputes before trusting them. Check: B13 shows the loan's yearly interest and B14 shows the owners' percent if the investor joins.
In A15 type Debt-to-equity now and in B15 type =B8/B6. In A16 type Debt-to-equity with the loan and in B16 type =(B8+B10)/B6. In A17 type Debt-to-equity with the investor and in B17 type =B8/(B6+B10). Copy each result, and the new totals behind it, into the offers table in Part 4. Tool: A free spreadsheet (Google Sheets, or any free spreadsheet) for every computation; the SBA's free planning pages and SCORE's free templates for the plan; the SEC's EDGAR full-text search and investor.gov for what a real filing and a real security are; Census, BEA, and BLS data tables for real figures; and one approved chatbot used as a pair consultant whose numbers the student recomputes before trusting them. Check: Three ratios appear, and the loan's is the highest of the three.
Complete the people table in Part 4 for both offers, write your recommendation, then paste the Part 6 prompt into one approved chatbot (or use the equivalent route), compare its reply with your tables, and write the critique report. Tool: A free spreadsheet (Google Sheets, or any free spreadsheet) for every computation; the SBA's free planning pages and SCORE's free templates for the plan; the SEC's EDGAR full-text search and investor.gov for what a real filing and a real security are; Census, BEA, and BLS data tables for real figures; and one approved chatbot used as a pair consultant whose numbers the student recomputes before trusting them. Check: You have a recommendation that names who gains and who gives something up, the strongest case for the other offer, and what would change your mind, plus a critique that quotes and corrects specific sentences.

Fallback route

When to use it: Use this route if a spreadsheet will not open or a formula will not run.

Work every step by hand from the figures printed in Part 4: add the three assets, add the two liabilities, add total liabilities and owners' equity, multiply 40,000 by 0.075 for the interest, subtract 40 from 100 for the owners' share, and divide total liabilities by owners' equity before and after each offer. Complete the people table, every analysis question, and the critique step, and submit the same items for equal credit.

This route earns the same credit as the primary route.

Part 4 — The Scaffold

Check that the nursery's balance sheet balances before you read any ratio from it.

Student scaffold table 1
Line	Amount (dollars)
Cash	9,000
Inventory	11,000
Greenhouse equipment	40,000
Total assets
Accounts payable	5,000
Bank loan	15,000
Total liabilities
Owners' equity	40,000
Total liabilities plus owners' equity

Lay the two offers side by side, because each one changes a different line of the balance sheet.

Student scaffold table 2
Situation	Interest a year (dollars)	Owners' share (percent)
Before either offer	none	100
The loan of 40,000 dollars at 7.5 percent a year		100
The investor's 40,000 dollars for a 40 percent share	none

Name the people each offer touches, because a weighed recommendation says who gains and who gives something up.

Student scaffold table 3
Offer	Who gains	Who gives something up	What would change your choice
The loan
The investor's share

Part 5 — Analysis Questions

Write the arithmetic that finds the nursery's total assets, total liabilities, and total liabilities plus owners' equity, the loan's interest a year, the owners' share with the investor, and debt-to-equity before either offer, with the loan, and with the investor, and say in a full sentence what the loan's ratio means for the nursery.
Using your offers table, say which balance-sheet line the loan changes and which line the investor's money changes, and explain why the two offers move debt-to-equity in opposite directions.
The nursery earned 15,000 dollars of net income last year. Compare the loan's interest a year with that net income, say what the interest would mean in a year when the greenhouse sells little, and explain what the investor's offer costs instead, keeping each computed figure apart from your judgment about it.
Choose one: (a) recommend whether the owners should take the loan or the investor's offer in 5–8 sentences, using your tables, naming one person who gives something up, the strongest case for the other offer, and the fact that would change your mind, and say which section of a business plan would carry the request; or (b) argue the offer you would least choose as strongly as you can in 5–8 sentences, then say in two sentences why you still hold your view or why you changed it.
Your tables rest on one year-end balance sheet and one year's net income from an illustrative business, and a ratio cannot tell you how well the greenhouse will sell. Name one way this evidence could mislead the owners, and say what they could check before signing either offer.

Part 6 — AI-Critique Moment

Choose one equal-credit critique route. Route A: ask an approved AI tool to critique your completed work, then check its response against your own evidence. Route B is the no-AI equivalent printed below.

Approved tools: Claude, Gemini, ChatGPT, Grok, Microsoft Copilot.

Prompt to paste:

I've pasted my completed Week 14 Business Case Workshop tables above. They describe an illustrative plant nursery, invented for a class activity, not a real business. As of its year-end, the nursery has cash of 9,000 dollars, inventory of 11,000 dollars, greenhouse equipment of 40,000 dollars, accounts payable of 5,000 dollars, a bank loan of 15,000 dollars, and owners' equity of 40,000 dollars, and last year it had revenue of 90,000 dollars and net income of 15,000 dollars. The owners want a 40,000-dollar greenhouse. A lender offers 40,000 dollars at 7.5 percent a year; an investor offers 40,000 dollars for a 40 percent share. Please do nine things. First, tell me the loan's interest a year and the nursery's debt-to-equity after each offer. Second, tell me what share of garden centers fail in their first five years. Third, compare the nursery with how a well-known national home-improvement chain finances its garden centers. Fourth, sort these into a SWOT: two staff members who know every plant by name, and a large housing development being built down the road. Fifth, tell me exactly whether the nursery can deduct the loan interest on its taxes and which tax form it should file. Sixth, tell me which offer is better. Seventh, write the owners a short growth plan. Eighth, tell me how much profit the nursery made last year. Ninth, draw up the nursery's balance sheet right after it takes the loan and buys the greenhouse.

Test the response for these likely failures:

Chatbots often divide owners' equity by total liabilities, giving the ratio upside down, or forget to add the 40,000-dollar loan to total liabilities before dividing, reporting the old ratio as if nothing changed.
Asked what share of garden centers fail in their first five years, chatbots often give a confident percentage with no source and no year.
Asked to compare with a well-known national home-improvement chain, chatbots often describe how that company finances or runs its garden centers, with no source.
Chatbots often list the new housing development among the nursery's strengths, because it sounds like good news for the business.
Chatbots often state exactly how the nursery should treat the loan interest on its taxes and which form to file, as if they knew its legal form, its state, and its records.
Asked which offer is better, chatbots often name a winner, usually the loan because it keeps full ownership, and never mention the 3,000 dollars owed even in a slow year, the investor's share of every future profit, or who else is affected.
Asked for a growth plan, chatbots often write general advice such as diversify your revenue streams, build your brand, and leverage social media, with nothing about the greenhouse, the two offers, or the nursery's own figures.
Asked for last year's profit, chatbots often report the 90,000 dollars of revenue as profit, or treat the 15,000 dollars of net income as cash available to pay for the greenhouse.
Asked for the balance sheet after the loan, chatbots often add the 40,000-dollar loan to liabilities but forget to add the greenhouse to assets, so the two sides no longer match.

Write 3–5 sentences naming one thing the chatbot got right and at least two places it went wrong or overreached, quoting its words and correcting each with evidence from your own tables or this week's chapter.

Equivalent route (no AI required)

No AI account is required for this workshop. Instead of the chatbot, critique this flawed analysis, printed here in full: "The loan costs 40,000 × 7.5 = 300,000 dollars a year in interest. Debt-to-equity after the loan is 40,000 ÷ 60,000 = 0.67, so the loan barely changes anything. About 60 percent of garden centers fail within five years, so the owners should act fast. A well-known national home-improvement chain borrows for all its garden centers, so the nursery should too. The nursery's biggest strength is the new housing development down the road. The owners can deduct every dollar of the interest on their taxes this year, so the loan is basically free. The loan is the better offer because the owners keep 100 percent, and nobody else is affected. To grow, the owners should diversify revenue, build their brand, and leverage social media. The nursery made 90,000 dollars of profit last year, so it can afford the greenhouse. After the loan, the balance sheet shows assets of 60,000 dollars, liabilities of 60,000 dollars, and owners' equity of 40,000 dollars." Mark it up: quote each flawed sentence, name what is wrong (an interest rate entered as a whole number, a ratio computed upside down, a figure with no source, an unsourced claim about a real firm, an outside opportunity filed as a strength, confident tax advice for one business, a one-sided verdict that ignores the investor's offer and the people affected, boilerplate that ignores the case, revenue treated as profit, or a balance sheet that does not balance), cite the evidence from your tables or the chapter, and write a corrected sentence beneath it. This route assesses the same objectives (Objective 7 and Objective 2) as the chatbot critique, takes comparable effort (about 30 minutes and 200–300 words), is scored by the same scoring criteria for the same credit, and its own submission artifact is the marked-up flawed analysis, posted in place of the chatbot share link and report.

Part 7 — What to Submit

All three completed scaffold tables
Written answers to all five analysis questions, including your recommendation
The chatbot critique report with its share link, or the equivalent route's marked-up flawed analysis

Deliverable:

A short Business Case Workshop report on an illustrative plant nursery's greenhouse decision: three completed tables (the balance sheet, the two offers, and the people affected), written answers to five analysis questions including a weighed recommendation, and a critique of a chatbot's analysis of the same case, or, on the equivalent route, a marked-up correction of the printed flawed analysis. Submit in any accessible file type or as a link; a recorded response may be submitted as audio or video with a transcript, or as text. Choose a written, recorded, or visual form for your answers; every form is graded by the same scoring criteria.

Rubric

The rubric below shows how each submitted part is evaluated; bands are full, partial, or none.

Workshop evaluation criteria
Criterion	Full	Partial	None
Running the balance-sheet and financing numbers	The three totals, the interest a year, the owners' share with the investor, and debt-to-equity before and after each offer are all found with the arithmetic shown, with the loan added to liabilities and the investor's money to owners' equity.	The tables are shown, but one or two amounts are off, a ratio is computed upside down, or the loan or the investor's money is left out of its line.	No tables are shown, or amounts are given with no arithmetic behind them.
Reading what each offer changes	The response says which line each offer changes and why the ratio moves each way, compares the interest with last year's net income, and states what the investor's offer costs instead, with fact and judgment labelled.	Most of these are present, but one line change is missing, the loan is called free money, or the investor is treated as a lender.	No reading of what the offers change is submitted.
A weighed recommendation	The recommendation or the argued other side rests on the offers table, names a person who gives something up, states the strongest case for the other offer, says what would change the decision, and places the request in the business plan's funding request.	A position is taken and tied to some case facts, but the case for the other offer, the person who gives something up, or what would change the decision is missing.	No recommendation is given, or it repeats general advice with no case facts.
Critiquing the AI analysis or the printed flawed analysis	The chatbot's analysis, or on the equivalent route the printed flawed analysis, is quoted and at least two errors are corrected with evidence from the tables or the chapter, including any invented figure, real-company claim, or tax rule flagged as outside this case.	The critique names errors but corrects only one, or corrects without evidence, on either route.	No critique is submitted on either route, or the AI output or flawed analysis is accepted without checking.
Naming the limitation of one year of numbers	The response names a specific way one balance sheet, one year's net income, or an illustrative case could mislead the owners and says what they could check before signing.	A limitation is named but not connected to what the owners should check.	No limitation is named.

Quality Gate

Every total, the interest, the owners' share, and every ratio come from your own arithmetic on the printed figures, never from a chatbot.
The balance sheet's two sides are checked to the dollar before any ratio is read from it.
Debt-to-equity divides total liabilities by owners' equity, with the loan added to liabilities and the investor's money added to owners' equity.
The loan is never called free money, the investor is never treated as a lender, and a lower ratio is never offered as proof that one offer is better.
The recommendation names at least one person who gives something up, the strongest case for the other offer, and what would change the answer; no statistic, real-company fact, or tax rule is invented.
The critique quotes the chatbot or the flawed analysis and corrects at least two errors with evidence from your tables or the chapter.

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