Some 70% of New Hampshire businesses reported a decrease in monthly revenue as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, and 42% said they are worse off than they were in June 2020, according to the New Hampshire Small Business Development Center’s new resiliency survey.
The 42% who said things are worse for them listed at the top of their concerns maintaining sales, revenue and customers, public acceptance of the vaccine, availability of the vaccine, supply chain disruptions, access to capital and cybersecurity.
The SBDC’s second resiliency survey was conducted in collaboration with the University of New Hampshire Survey Center in partnership with 56 business organizations across the state.
All told, 1,611 businesses from 174 New Hampshire communities took part, with the highest concentration of businesses reporting from the Seacoast and northern New Hampshire. Organizers plan to use the results from the survey to provide services and policies that best support the businesses of the state.
The survey found that, overall, businesses are still contracting because of the pandemic. Nearly half have reduced their hours of operations and a third closed temporarily. Three
in eight report having fewer employees, and the average number of
employees decreased to 12, down slightly from mid-February 2020.
Three-fourths
of the businesses reached in the survey said they applied for relief in
2020, and just over half said they planned to apply for relief in 2021.
The most common assistance came through
the federal Paycheck Protection Program — nine of 10 said their
business received it. A little over half received an Economic Injury
Disaster advance or loan. One in four were able to maintain or bring
back employees under PPP, and over a third changed the layout of their
business to protect employees.
Liz
Gray, state director of the Small Business Development Center, says the
organization will be launching a cybersecurity initiative as a result
of its recent resiliency survey. As
for the future, businesses cited access to customers, health and safety
guidance, financial assistance and access to the Covid-19 vaccine for
their employees as the most important for their business going forward.
“I
know a lot of people are talking about survey fatigue, but we actually
got more responses in Phase 2,” said Liz Gray, director of the SBDC. The
previous phase had around 1,500 respondents, while this phase had
1,611.
Gray thinks the high response rate was prompted by businesses interested in sharing their Covid-19 experiences.
She also said the SBDC is launching a cybersecurity initiative.
The
number of businesses concerned about cybersecurity increased by 7% from
last year’s resiliency survey — a data point that Gray finds
“particularly interesting.” Due to an increase in e-commerce and social
media presence among businesses during the pandemic, the SBDC
anticipates that cybersecurity will remain a growing concern in the
state.
The initiative,
which will be in partnership with the NH Tech Alliance, will provide
businesses with a cybersecurity resiliency guide, advisory services and
other resources.
Gray said the SBDC plans to conduct a third phase of the survey this summer.
— KATIE HOPPLER
