Over the last two years, it has been widely reported that small businesses create more jobs than big businesses and thus are critical to the recovery. It has also been widely reported that small businesses are getting squeezed — by the credit freeze, by skyrocketing costs like health and unemployment insurance, and by cheap imports, to name a few examples.
So, if you own a small business, is the deck stacked against you? Can you overcome all of the obstacles? Is it harder than it used to be to start a business? Is it going to continue to get harder? Are the banks going to loosen up? Is the “recovery” ever going to reach small businesses the way it has big businesses? Which is it: Are small businesses going to be saviors or victims?
Both. The small businesses that succeed will need to do more than just hope. And they will need to do more than just complain about the government and wait for it to solve all problems. The real answer is to cope. It’s always been that way. A successful entrepreneur copes with whatever problems come along, and there are sure to be plenty of them. Business ownership requires the wearing of many hats, which is part of the reason the failure rate for start-ups is high (about half survive for five years). To thrive, you have to understand accounting, finance, marketing, and management. It’s probably not enough to be great at just one or even two of those categories.
What is going to get the economy humming and send people back to work? The entrepreneur/warriors who figure out how to get past the problems, how to find money even when it’s tight, how to find opportunity among the ashes and how to find new ideas. Some of those ideas will come from a new generation that has been conditioned to believe that it can do anything. Some among this new generation will fail and move back in with their parents. A few will become fabulously rich and famous doing something with computers that I won’t understand. And others, hundreds of thousands of others, will start, take over from their parents or buy businesses that have a value proposition. They will make better cupcakes, they will clean your clothes in a more green fashion, they will cut your hair and they will recycle your computer (and they will make computers that aren’t toxic). They will be men, women, straight, gay and of every ethnicity.
Entrepreneurship has certainly gotten more complicated. In some ways technology has helped, and in other ways it has only added to the list of things we need to know, the hats we need to wear. The government is working through the Small Business Administration to free up more money, and some of the tax incentives are beneficial. I can also report that entrepreneurs have infinitely more resources at their disposal than when I started my business in 1978. Then, the word entrepreneur was rarely used, and when it was used, it tended to be in a negative way, like referring to the guy on the street corner selling watches on his arm. These days, many colleges have entrepreneurship programs that were unheard of 30 years ago. The S.B.A. offers support and loans, and there are several large foundations that have programs. There is help if you look for it.
I’ll tell you why the entrepreneurs will continue to succeed, as well as fail. This is America, the land of opportunity, but opportunity does not knock for entrepreneurs — it lurks. It is everywhere that something can be done better, cheaper or faster. Capitalism works (most of the time). Loans will be available because the lenders will make money from them (although the loans may be at a higher interest rate, and they may not be come from the big banks). This recession has been different from past recessions because we are living through some profound changes in the marketplace.
But we are beginning to readjust to the new environment. It bears repeating that we have been struggling with a recession, a bank crisis, a real estate meltdown, and a technology shift. It may take a little more time to re-boot. The elections are over, the rhetoric should stop, it’s time to go back to work. Entrepreneurs will find a way and lead the way. Jobs will be created, products and services will be sold, and loans will be paid back — most of them, anyway. Some people will go broke trying. It is not possible to have opportunity without risk. Failure is also part of the American way. The successful will cope. Save your hope for world peace.
Happy New Year!
Jay Goltz owns five small businesses in Chicago.
