2012 - Will this be a year for growth for your business?

Steve I selected option 2 - I think the media coverage has a lot to answer for, every time I watch the news some one is in trouble financially, which makes it feel a lot worse than it is.

I am pretty sure every new year one of the bigger shops struggled over the xmas and faces shutting down in the new year - even in the boom times this happened.

The only difference I can see is that it is harder for companies to get money out of us, every time I go to the shops at the weekend I can hardly move.

So for me I think overall things will remain neutral, with a small up side during the year.

I'm playing the optimistic card I think 2010 & 11 was a wake up call for the High Street and big business, I think you're right, I reckon we will see a few more major chains go pop. The rest will evolve out of necessity and survival.

But the Euro-crisis will be resolved in some shape or form this year, regardless of any pain caused (and there will be plenty). I'm not a follower of the media apocalypse and armegeddon scenario.

Hopefully a more viable and stable Eurozone will stop the media hysteria, and although big business and manufacturing will bear the brunt, I think this could be a good year for small businesses and start ups. There should be deals galore, from hosting to marketing, hardware to software. If you need staff, it's an employers market, university schemes etc are falling over themselves to try and place graduates and interns.

Businesses still need to spend money, the difference is they are a lot more careful now who they spend their money with, and now carefully scrutinize annual or monthly payments instead of just letting them roll. Not necessarily a bad thing, we just all need to keep on our toes and make sure we are offering the best product or service at the best price.

Be interesting to revisit this in 12 months, hopefully not sitting in our underground bunkers...

I voted for number one, although I feel that the HMRC will do more damage to small businesses than the recession ever will with

I voted number 1
Last year we expected to really struggle with all the scaremongering that went on.
We did struggle..... to cope with all the work that came in.
We struggled to get people who wanted to work.

So based on last year we are hoping for steady growth and even if its not growth like we had this year, I'm confident it will continue.

Hi Steve, I voted for being optimistic over the next year. We are a fairly new business having only been in operation 6 months. Hopefully despite the challenging trading conditions we can continue to grow throughout the next 12 months.

Well if you can launch and survive in this climate, you will fly when conditions get better!

I went with number 1 as well and as I hadn't read the posts beforehand I was pleasantly surprised to see that I'm not in the minority.

I've noticed that customers are more careful about how they spend their money, but it's still out there if you're willing to adapt to the conditions.

The economy is not easy to recover soon .But the business has to continue.Hope the business will be better and better in this year.

I couldn't put it any better

We are in the same situation, our business was born from the result of a redundancy pay off from a large bank right in the middle of the credit crunch!

And we have launched and survived, and I think we will be stronger for it, we don't know any different conditions, as owners and directors of a business anyway!