Chamber Chat: Maryland Ranking Low for Small Business

Salisbury, Md. – In this week’s Chamber Chat, WMDT’s John Trout and Salisbury Area Chamber of Commerce President Bill Chambers discussed how small businesses are struggling to stay afloat in the state of Maryland.

Bill Chambers explained that when ranking states in terms of economic feasibility for small business, Maryland dropped from 26th to 49th. Roughly 50% of small businesses cite recent inflation as their biggest hinderance from being able to invest in themselves, with only one third of businesses surveyed expected to be able to reasonably invest in growth. Less than one third is expected to add employees in 2027, according to Chambers.

The upcoming election season was blamed for business owners hesitating to spend money, saying “They don’t know what’s going to happen after November” said Bill.

“The other part of the survey that really bothered us at the chamber was only 20% of our regional small businesses say that they are currently comfortable with their current cash flow” explained Bill. Due to these responses from Business owners, Chambers was concerned to see how this also impacted the tourism season.