After surviving the worst, small business owners are now planning for the best. A new study, "U.S. Small Business Outlook 2010: Lessons Learned—A Case for Greater Optimism," conducted by CIT Group and Forbes Insights, found that 60% of small business owners believe their businesses will grow this year. "We think we're going to hold our own and grow very slowly," says Mark Astle, owner of M.L. Schuman Co. (asi/321200). "Last year we were down about five percent and cut expenses and took care of that. This year we're slightly ahead of last year. We're optimistic about it."
Part of the positive attitude comes from the challenges since the financial crisis hit. Of the 220 owners surveyed in the CIT study, 81% say they feel smarter about running a small business now, with 70% saying that the challenges of the recession made them stronger leaders. "2009 was really rough in particular for small companies," said Stuart Feil, editorial director of Forbes Insights, a research group at Forbes Publishing, which co-authored the study. "It's really ‘what doesn't kill you makes you stronger,' and sometimes small business owners have to be forced into an appraisal of their company and their abilities."
Feil says that while a small business owner may have known prior to the recession that it needed to improve its planning or expand its client base, the financial crisis really brought these lessons home in a visceral way. The sorts of challenges faced by companies during this time have led to a reassessment of their own business fundamentals, according to Feil. An additional 45% of respondents said that the recession exposed issues in their business strategies that were not previously apparent to them. Fifty-nine percent plan to have a greater focus on operating efficiencies to achieve growth this year, while 62% said they will invest more in marketing and advertising and half (50%) plan to invest in expansion.
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