B.C. Small Business Owners Facing Crisis of Confidence

British Columbia is reportedly facing a crisis of confidence. Surveys indicate that both consumers and small business owners are feeling less optimistic about the future. The recent closure of Small Business BC, an organization that provided grants and services to smaller businesses, has likely exacerbated anxiety among business owners. Small Business BC filed for bankruptcy in early December.

According to a Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) survey conducted in October for a November report, B.C. small business owners are the least confident in Canada that their ventures will perform better in three months. They are also the second-least confident about their businesses performing better in 12 months, trailing only Newfoundland-based owners. Provincial confidence levels have also been declining. CFIB found that 46.3 percent of B.C. respondents expected their profitability to improve in three months, down from 48.1 percent one month earlier and below the average of 54.3 percent across the 15 years CFIB has asked this question in its surveys. Diminished optimism is also present when entrepreneurs look out a year. The 55.4 percent of B.C. small business owners who said in October that they expected their business to fare better in 12 months was down from the 56.5 percent one month earlier and from an average of 67.4 percent since February 2009. What makes that low confidence level for a one-year outlook surprising is that B.C. small-businesses owners have historically, on average, led all provinces with the most optimistic outlooks. 'It's not just the comparison over time, it's a comparison to where we are relative to other provinces in Canada,' said B.C.-based CFIB policy analyst Emily Boston. 'Most of those provinces have a far more optimistic outlook looking ahead over the next year, or just in the short term,

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