Economy Down-Entrepreneurship Up

I was reading an article in the N.Y. Times entitled, On to Plan B: Starting a Business. The article discusses the rise of entrepreneurship during the period that began 18 months ago it calls “The Great Recession”.

Due to the rise in unemployment more people are seeking the entrepreneurial route. So as work choices narrow more people are going into business for themselves than continuing on the path of seeking employment. As we know the job market is a very tough place today, so it makes perfect sense that more people want to shape their own financial future.

So here is the part of the article that caught my attention. “Accidental or by design, entrepreneurship is on the rise again this year. LegalZoom, the online legal document service, says the number of new businesses it helped to form was up 10 percent in the first half of the year, compared with the period a year earlier.
“We were surprised,” says Brian Liu, co-founder and chairman of LegalZoom. “We expected there to be a drastic downtick.”

LegalZoom’s top five areas of incorporation, he says, are real estate, consulting, Internet (including electronic commerce), retail, and construction and contractors.”

It says that one of the top 5 areas of incorporation is, Internet (including electronic commerce). That comes as no surprise to me. The Internet combined with information products allows a person to have a global business from home. Which makes the barrier to entry very low, as it does not require a great deal of capital (have you tried getting a bank loan recently?).

Now the article continues to state some facts, which I think you’ll find remarkable.
“Many companies with billion-dollar market capitalizations were started during a recession, the report said, including Starbucks, Intuit and PetSmart.

Research from Kauffman in June found that more than half of the companies on the Fortune 500 list in 2009 and nearly half of the companies on the Inc. magazine 2008 list were founded during a recession or bear market.”

It just goes to show you that there is never a bad time to strike out on your own. If billion dollar companies were started in a recession I’d like to know how many multi-million dollar companies started in that same recession.

Did you get that, more than half of the Fortune 500 companies were started during a recession. So my trusted readers I say if you have the passion and desire move forward make a plan and do that one yet critical step, take action now.