Business & Commercial
Coverage that keeps the business running when things go wrong.
From a one-truck owner-operator to a 50-employee operation. We write the full commercial lineup and we know which carriers actually pay claims fast.
General Liability
The baseline policy every business should have.
Commercial general liability (CGL) covers third-party bodily injury, property damage, and personal/advertising injury claims from your business operations. Someone slips in your shop. A subcontractor damages a client's floor. A competitor sues over an ad. GL is what responds.
Most landlords, vendors, and large clients require proof of GL before they'll do business with you. Limits typically start at $1M per occurrence / $2M aggregate.
GL typically covers
- Bodily injury to third parties
- Property damage to others
- Personal & advertising injury
- Medical payments
- Defense costs
- Products / completed operations
Business Owners Policy · BOP
GL + property + business income, packaged.
A BOP bundles general liability, commercial property, and business income (loss of revenue when you can't operate) into one policy. For most small businesses — retail, restaurants, offices, professional services — it's the most cost-effective way to get the coverage you actually need.
Once you add employees, vehicles, or specialty risk, we layer in workers' comp, commercial auto, and other coverages around it.
BOP usually includes
- General liability
- Building & contents (commercial property)
- Business income / extra expense
- Equipment breakdown (often optional)
- Cyber liability (often optional)
Workers' Compensation
Required in almost every state once you have employees.
Workers' comp pays for medical care and lost wages when an employee gets hurt on the job — and protects you from being sued personally for the injury. Illinois requires it for any business with employees (some narrow exceptions).
Premium is based on payroll and class code. We help right-classify employees (mis-classification is the #1 audit problem) and shop carriers to find the best rate for your specific operation.
Why classification matters
An employee classified as "clerical" pays a small fraction of what a "roofer" pays. Get it wrong at policy issue, and you owe the difference at audit. We make sure it's right going in.
Audit shocks are preventable. Most of them come from sloppy initial setup, not actual changes in the business.
Commercial Auto
Personal auto policies don't cover business use. Period.
If you use a vehicle for work — making deliveries, hauling tools, visiting clients, transporting employees — a claim under your personal auto policy will often be denied. You need commercial auto.
We write single vehicles, small fleets, and specialty configurations (refrigerated trucks, contractor vans, food trucks, vehicles with permanent equipment installed).
What gets covered
- Liability (BI + PD)
- Collision & comprehensive
- Hired & non-owned auto
- Medical payments / PIP
- Uninsured / underinsured motorist
- Trailer interchange (for trucking)
Commercial Property
Building, contents, equipment, inventory, business income.
For larger operations that need more than a BOP delivers, standalone commercial property covers the building you own or lease, your business contents, your equipment, inventory, and the income you'd lose if a fire or covered loss shut you down.
We write owner-occupied buildings, tenant-occupied (built-out leasehold improvements), and mixed-use properties. Replacement cost vs. actual cash value is a key conversation — we'll explain the difference.
Common coverages
- Building & structure
- Business personal property
- Equipment breakdown
- Business income & extra expense
- Ordinance & law
- Inland marine (mobile equipment)
- Spoilage (for food businesses)
Commercial Umbrella
Extra liability for when your underlying limits aren't enough.
A commercial umbrella adds $1M, $5M, or $10M+ of liability coverage on top of your general liability, commercial auto, and employer's liability (under workers' comp). When a serious claim exceeds your underlying policy limits, umbrella picks up the rest.
Required by many large contracts. Strongly recommended for any business with vehicles, customer-facing operations, or significant assets to protect.
Sits on top of
- Commercial general liability
- Commercial auto liability
- Employer's liability (WC)
- Liquor liability (if applicable)
Cyber Liability
One ransomware attack can end a small business.
Cyber insurance covers first-party costs (your own response: forensics, notification, credit monitoring, ransomware payments, business interruption) and third-party costs (lawsuits from customers whose data was exposed).
Small businesses are increasingly targeted — they have valuable data and less defense. Average cost of a breach for a small business runs into six figures. The policy costs a fraction of that.
Typical cyber coverage
- Data breach response & notification
- Forensic investigation
- Ransomware & cyber extortion
- Business interruption (cyber)
- Third-party privacy liability
- Regulatory fines & defense
- Social engineering / wire fraud
Key Person Life Insurance
If losing one person would seriously hurt the business — insure that person.
Key person insurance is life insurance the business owns on someone whose contribution is critical: a founder, a top producer, a CEO, a lead engineer. The business pays the premium. If that person dies, the death benefit goes to the business — to cover lost revenue, recruit a replacement, repay loans, or buy out heirs.
Often pairs with a buy-sell agreement (next section). Both are uses of life insurance where the policy works for the business, not the family.
Common uses
- Replace revenue lost during transition
- Recruit and train a replacement
- Repay business loans
- Reassure lenders, partners, customers
- Fund a buy-sell agreement
Buy-Sell Agreements
What happens to the business if a partner dies? Decide now.
A buy-sell agreement is a contract among business owners that spells out what happens if one of them dies, becomes disabled, or leaves. Life insurance funds the agreement — when a partner dies, the policy pays out, and the surviving partners use the proceeds to buy the deceased partner's share from the family.
Without one, you can end up in business with a partner's spouse, kids, or estate — none of whom signed up for it. With one, the transition is clean: family gets cash, business stays intact, surviving partners keep control.
Structures we help set up
- Cross-purchase (partners insure each other)
- Entity-purchase (business owns policies)
- Hybrid / wait-and-see
- Disability buyout funding
Investment Property & Small Business Specialty
For real estate investors, contractors, and specialty operations.
We handle commercial property for real estate investors (rental portfolios, mixed-use, commercial leases), contractor packages (builder's risk, tools & equipment, installation floater), restaurant and hospitality packages, and specialty exposures (event liability, liquor liability, professional liability).
If your business is unusual, that's not a problem. We have the carrier relationships to place harder-to-write risks.
Specialty coverage we write
- Builders risk
- Contractor tools & equipment
- Restaurant & hospitality
- Liquor liability
- Event liability
- Professional liability (E&O)
- Multi-property real estate portfolios
TRUCKER SECURE™
Trucking insurance, built for owner-operators.
Trucking is its own world. The wrong policy doesn't just cost more — it can keep you off the road. We've built TRUCKER SECURE™ around what owner-operators and small fleets actually need: fast COIs, FMCSA-compliant filings, and carriers that don't drop you after one claim.
We write primary auto liability, cargo, physical damage, non-trucking liability, occupational accident, and workers' comp. Long-haul, regional, local, hazmat, and refrigerated. Single power unit up to 25-truck fleets.
TRUCKER SECURE™ coverage
- Primary auto liability
- Cargo
- Physical damage (truck & trailer)
- Non-trucking liability (bobtail)
- Occupational accident
- Workers' comp (for fleet operations)
- Trailer interchange
- FMCSA / MCS-90 filings
- 24-hour COI turnaround
Get a proposal
Tell us about the business. We'll put a package together.
One conversation, multiple carriers compared. Independent agency advantage.
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