Fifteen percent of Black small-business owners had to close their doors during the pandemic. As ESSENCE previously reported, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found that small businesses in the U.S. dropped 22 percent between February 2020 and April 2020, but Black ownership dropped 41 percent—the greatest decline among all racial groups during the depths of the pandemic.
According to a new report from Yelp, the small business ecosystem is showing signs of officially rebounding. Per their findings, in 2022, business openings reached an all-time high, with new business growth in 86% of states exceeding pre-pandemic (2019) levels.
Most interesting, the most growth took place in the southern states.
As ESSENCE previously pointed out Atlanta, Georgia was found to have the highest percentage of Black-owned businesses at 7.4% across the 50 metros in the U.S per a 2023 report from financial platform Lending Tree.
The rapid business growth in 2022 could be attributed to headwinds from inflation and recovering supply chain processes that were fractured during the height of the pandemic. According to an analysis from the Economic Innovation Group, nearly 1.7 million applications to form new businesses likely to hire employees were filed in 2022—the second most of any year on record.
“Amid another turbulent year, local businesses demonstrated their ability to persevere through labor shortages, high inflation, supply chain challenges, and more,” Yelp’s report states. “{The growth} was largely driven by new home and local services businesses, while new restaurants, shopping and nightlife business openings fell behind pre-pandemic levels.”