A fifth of small businesses in Northern Ireland say they have shrunk in the last year, according to a survey by Enterprise Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n
The 2025 Enterprise Barometer found weak cashflows, the rising costs and challenges with skills and technology are widespread issues.<\/p>\n
It is the seventh year the organisation, which represents 27 Local Enterprise Agencies in the region, has carried out the study of micro, small and self-employed businesses.<\/p>\n
Its chief executive said the results should be “ringing alarm bells”.<\/p>\n
“Our entrepreneurs are sending a very clear message: the ambition is absolutely there, but pressure is halting progress,” Michael McQuillan said.<\/p>\n
“Businesses want simple, visible, joined-up support. They want clarity, consistency and a system that moves as fast as they need it to,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It would be reckless not to listen to them,” he added.<\/p>\n
However, 56% of businesses did say they felt optimistic about growth in the coming year, up from 43% of businesses last year.<\/p>\n
Rising costs were found to be a major challenge, with 78% of those surveyed saying theirs had increased in the last year.<\/p>\n
Utilities, raw materials, and insurance were named as the areas which impacted the most businesses.<\/p>\n
Two thirds said issues in the labour market were putting them under strain and limiting growth, with over half saying it is difficult to find the right skills.<\/p>\n
A third said their cashflow position is weak or critical.<\/p>\n
The research also found AI was an issue frequently raised by respondents who said they needed support with the new technology.<\/p>\n
“As cost pressures continue to mount, the resilience and ambition shown by our entrepreneurs continues to impress,” Northern Ireland’s Minister for the Economy, Dr Caoimhe Archibald, said.<\/p>\n
She said that her department is “committed to driving local economic growth and promoting regional balance”.<\/p>\n
“This year’s Barometer provides one of the clearest indications yet that the pressures facing our small and micro businesses are becoming deeply embedded,” economist Maureen O’Reilly said.<\/p>\n
“The resilience and ambition shown by many firms is remarkable, but we cannot ignore the fact that one in five are now contracting and a significant number are experiencing prolonged financial strain,” she stated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A fifth of small businesses in Northern Ireland say they have shrunk in the last year, according to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":298585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,1294,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-298584","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-economy","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/298584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=298584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/298584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/298585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=298584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=298584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=298584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}