The ambush lacked planning, but after listening to local economist Michael Toma’s forecast on every industry sector except small business, Marjorie Young and Joe Marchese blitzed Toma anyway.
Why is the small business community, which makes up more than half the local economy, never mentioned during the Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce’s annual Economic Outlook Luncheon?
Because, Toma answered, the data simply isn’t available.
“Very little exists,” Toma said. “And what does, like some that I get from the Department of Labor, have confidentiality issues.”
Young and Marchese resolved that January 2012 day to find Toma some numbers to analyze. They leveraged Young’s standing as the leader of SCORE, a small business mentoring and counseling organization, and Marchese’s position as the head of the chamber’s Small Business Council to connect with small business leaders across the county.
The efforts culminate this Thursday with the first State of Small Business forum. Toma will be among 12 speakers at the event, with each summarizing aspects of the local small business economy.
Toma will open the forum with a small business snapshot. Other presenters will cover the state of small business lending, commercial real estate trends, workforce development challenges for small businesses and how economic indicators impact small businesses, among other topics.
“The goal is to give a true outlook of what’s happening in Savannah small business,” Young said.
Let the numbers speak
The forum will be fast paced, with each presentation limited to three minutes. The two-hour event, which begins at 11 a.m. Thursday in the Savannah Mall community room, will also include a question-and-answer session moderated by Bill Dawers, the Savannah Morning News’ City Talk columnist.
The data will be the focus, Young said. Each speaker is preparing a one-page summary of their topic.
Among the nuggets submitted are business openings and closings and revenue trends in unincorporated Chatham County.
New businesses have been on the increase while closings have been dropping since 2011, according to the county’s occupational tax division manager, Barbara Baucum. Revenue, meanwhile, is on the comeback after dropping 24 percent in 2011
Commercial real estate trends will also be of interest, Young said. Occupancy rates have fallen significantly since the recession’s end, a topic Rhett Mouchet with the Mouchet & Mitchell Group, Judge Realty’s commercial real estate arm, will cover during his presentation.
“This information will give us an indication of if it’s a good time to hire, invest or what have you,” Young said.
The event will also mark the debut of the findings of a local small business confidence index survey. SCORE crafted the survey, which includes questions regarding specific business plans, as well as attitudes toward the economy. Only 19 local small businesses have responded thus far, although the hope is the State of Small Business forum will increase interest.
Marchese envisions the forum as another platform for Savannah’s small business leaders to connect and share information.
“When we work together,” he said, “we have a voice.”
STATE OF SMALL BUSINESS
When: 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., Thursday
Where: Savannah Mall Community Room (lower level)
What: Free admission, although RSVP encouraged through savannah.score.org or 912-652-4335.
SPEAKER LINEUP
• Michael Toma, director of Armstrong’s Center for Regional Analysis
Topic: Small business snapshot
• Mohsen Badran, CEO of Goodwill Industries of Coastal Empire
Topic: Overcoming barriers to employment
• Susan Dober, director of training and development at Great Dane Trailers
Topic: Savannah’s small business confidence index survey
• Jerald Mitchell, SEDA’s director of innovation
Topic: Business in Savannah
• Marshall Tuck, corporate small business officer at Gulfstream Aerospace
Topic: Gulfstream Aerospace and small business
• Paul Schneider, regional coordinator for Georgia Department of Labor
Topic: Workforce development challenges for small businesses
• Susanne Toney, assistant economics professor at Savannah State University
Topic: How economic indicators impact Savannah area small businesses
• Kyle Hensel, director of UGA Small Business Center in Savannah
Topic: Securing funding with small business counseling
• Tony O’Reilly, president of Small Business Assistance Corp.
Topic: Small business access to capital in the Savannah region
• Rhett Mouchet, commercial real estate agent with Mouchet & Mitchell Group
Topic: Commercial real estate trends
• Brian Johnson, city manager of Garden City
Topic: Small business in Garden City
• Barbara Baucum, manager of Chatham County occupational tax division
Topic: New business trends in Chatham County
• Emily Galloway, area retail banking president at Wells Fargo
Topic: The state of small business lending
Source: SCORE Savannah chapter