True story · retold with care
Kevin Plank had $2,000 left and a payroll to make
In 1997 Under Armour was a young apparel business with real orders on its books and almost nothing in the bank. Kevin Plank had funded the whole thing on around $40,000 of credit card debt spread across five cards, and when payroll came round there was roughly $2,000 left in the company account.
He drove to Atlantic City to try to turn it into enough, and lost it. On the way home he could not cover the $2 toll on the Delaware Memorial Bridge. Under Armour survived, but not because of that night. It survived because the orders eventually turned into money.
What went wrong
Orders are not cash. Growth is paid for up front, in stock and wages and suppliers, and repaid weeks later when customers settle. A business can be busy, profitable on paper, and still be days away from a wage run it cannot make.
The habit that prevents it
Know how many weeks of payroll your cash covers, and check that number more often than you check revenue. The moment worth acting on is while there are still weeks in it.
How you'd see this coming in Punctual
Your dashboard shows cash on hand and what is owed to you as it stands today, so a payroll crunch is something you watch approaching rather than discover on the morning.