Weekly Dispatch: Suprising Signs of Small Business Resiliency

The Dispatch scours the Web every Monday to find must-read news that affects you and your business, and what it really means. Here's what I'm reading this week.
1. Owners need one thing to spark the economy -- a loan The takeaway: Here's the good news: The Federal Reserve's financial crisis survey shows that both small business owners who fared worse than the normal population during the Great Recession and those whose wealth actually grew during the period applied for business loans, signaling that both populations are planning for future growth. In January of this year, more banks reported an increase in loan applications than a decrease, the first time that has happened since early 2006. And the Atlanta Reserve Bank's small business survey shows that newer businesses are particularly optimistic, with larger percentages planning to increase sales, employees, and capital expenditures over the next six months to a year.
The bad news, of course, is that credit remains tight, and even the companies that grew during the downturn have had trouble getting loans.

2. Are business owners less bullish than the surveys suggest?
The takeaway: Over the last few months, business surveys have brought good news, showing that small businesses are optimistic about the economy and planning to hire new employees. But a new survey by Discover Financial Services shows that confidence among small business owners is actually waning, and that 76 percent of respondents said that the jump in gas prices is taking a toll on their businesses. More than half -- 54 percent -- reported that they believe the economy is getting worse (up from only 41 percent in February), while nearly a third said that they had considered going out of business at some point in the last two months (a higher percentage than in Spring of 2008).

3. Chart of the week: The smallest firms lost fewer jobs during the Great Recession
The takeaway: The big lesson from ADP's Employment Report is that businesses with fewer than 50 employees lost the smallest proportion of workers, but that medium-sized firms with between 50 and 499 employees are adding them back faster. Small Business Trends breaks down the statistics in chart form, so that you can see what the data actually looks like.

4. Defense Dept. reaches out to entrepreneurs
The takeaway: The Department of Defense wants to boost the percentage of its contracting budget that goes to small businesses, from last year's 21.9 percent to somewhere above 23 percent, officials told entrepreneurs at a procurement conference in Detroit last week. Every year, the federal agency awards contracts worth between $150 and $200 billion to small businesses, so the increase of even one percentage points means another $4 billion for small business owners.

5. Squeezing a small business into your home
The takeaway: A little more than half of American entrepreneurs are operating their businesses out of their homes, which is to say their guest rooms, closets, basements, and garages. Here's a photo gallery that lets you check out how other business owners who work from home have managed to get organized and increase their productivity.

6. 10 ways to soothe the pain of tax time

The takeaway: A lot of tax tips give you great advice that would have been useful about a year ago -- like keep track of your documents or pay your taxes quarterly. That's not a whole lot of help when we're only a little more than two weeks to the deadline. This list gives you five tips for filing now, and five that can have you more prepared for next year.

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