The stories of gloom and doom are everywhere. Surprisingly enough, I ran across an article in the Wall Street Journal that discussed what was happening in North Carolina. It even focused on the town of Hickory, located just one hour away from me.
“North Carolina’s widely lauded economic transformation of the last three decades — in which the state diversified away from its dependence on agriculture and textiles and into technology, banking and pharmaceuticals — is proving no match for what could be the longest and deepest U.S. recession since World War II.”
Apparently North Carolina is one of the states struggling the most in this economic downturn, losing a bigger percentage of jobs than any other state in the country (1.1% of the NC workforce from October to November 2008, or a loss of 46,000 positions, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics). The North Carolina unemployment rate for November 2009 of 7.9% was the highest in 26 years. According to The Wall Street Journal, until recently the Southeastern US seemed to be weathering the slowdown better than other regions. And now - this part of the country is suffering equally.
So what to do? When the going gets tough….the tough create their own businesses. Microsbusinesses, actually. Although we’re all more familiar with the catch-all label of ‘small business’, a microbusiness is a business with fewer than five employees that is often started in one’s home. As I discussed earlier this month in ‘The Advantage of Rural Home Businesses in 2009‘, rural businesses are uniquely positioned to begin, grow and survive because of their ‘lean and mean’ approach and small size, allowing faster and often more creative responses than larger businesses.
Sometimes a person will take a risk and pursue starting their own business when they have little or nothing to lose. When someone loses their job or can’t get a second job to meet monthly expenses, starting a new business ‘on the side’ begins to look more and more attractive, and less and less risky. Trendwatchers predict we’ll see a record growth in the number of ‘microbusinesses’ created in 2009.
So how will your rural business be affected this year? What products or services can you add? How can you adapt?
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