{"id":1220,"date":"2012-01-19T11:22:50","date_gmt":"2012-01-19T16:22:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.123print.com\/?p=1220"},"modified":"2012-01-19T11:22:50","modified_gmt":"2012-01-19T16:22:50","slug":"what-is-a-small-business-what-is-a-micro-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/what-is-a-small-business-what-is-a-micro-business\/","title":{"rendered":"What is a Small Business? What is a Micro Business?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u201cA \u2018small business,\u2019 also called \u2018mom and pop store\u2019 by some in the United States, is a business that is privately owned and operated, with a small number of employees and relatively low volume of sales. Small businesses are normally privately owned corporations, partnerships, or sole proprietorships. \u201c- Wikipedia<\/a><\/p>\n

So often you hear the terms \u201csmall business\u201d and \u201cmicro business\u201d thrown around like everyone understands what constitutes these two separate types of businesses. Exactly how small is a \u201csmall business?\u201d Is it 50 employees? Is it 10 employees? What is it?! It\u2019s important to mention that the legal definition of \u201csmall\u201d is going to vary from country to country and by industry, so we\u2019ll only be focusing on the United States for now.<\/p>\n

Politicians are probably the most guilty of throwing around \u201csmall business,\u201d like everyone understands what they mean. Now, I have no desire to get political on anyone so don\u2019t worry. FactCheck.org<\/a> said, \u201cThe Small Business Administration\u2019s Office of Advocacy defines a small business as one of with fewer than 500 employees. And that\u2019s the standard politicians often use.\u201d Wow. To be considered a \u201csmall business\u201d you have to have fewer than 500 employees? Ask yourself, so what does that make the five guys that run and operate their own mechanic shop or the two sisters that have started their own cupcake bakery out of their home?<\/p>\n

According to Wikipedia, \u201cin addition to number of employees, other methods [can be] used to classify small companies [including] annual sales, value of assets and net profit.\u201d There\u2019s a multitude of factors that go into determining if a business is a \u201csmall business\u201d or not. Do you or your business fall into any of these typical examples of small businesses?<\/p>\n

\u2022 Bakeries
\n\u2022 Delicatessens
\n\u2022 Accountants
\n\u2022 Photographers
\n\u2022 Online business such as web design or programming
\n\u2022 Tradesmen
\n\u2022 Hairdressers<\/p>\n

Alright, so we\u2019ve established a very basic overview of what constitutes a \u201csmall business,\u201d and you\u2019re probably still scratching your head trying to figure out where you and your homegrown business fall.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Just as difficult to define as a \u201csmall business,\u201d there\u2019s really not one specific definition for a \u201cmicro business.\u201d For the sake of this post, we\u2019ll go with the common definition of a \u201cmicro business,\u201d which according to Lloyd Lemons is something much smaller than a small business. How much smaller? Well, a small business has less than 500 employees so obviously less than that. Basically, the definition is all over the place depending on the country or state being discussed. Some states define a micro-business as being less than 10 or employees, and some say 25 employees or less. The Association of Enterprise Opportunities<\/a> is probably the most descriptive and helpful, \u201cIn the United States, a microenterprise is usually defined as a business with five or fewer employees, small enough to require initial capital of $35,000 or less; the average microloan is about $7000.\u201d<\/p>\n

For arguments sake, Lemons characterizes \u201cmicro-businesses\u201d as those who<\/p>\n

\u2026refer to themselves as soloists, independents, consultants, craftsmen, artists, musicians, freelancers, free agents, and self-employed people. The majority of these companies are one-person enterprises. The majority of these companies operate out of their homes; and many of these companies have part-time help from a family member or friends.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So with this basic knowledge\u2026 where do you fit in? Ignore the definitions and ideas put forth for a second, what do you consider yourself?<\/p>\n

Here at 123Print<\/a> we\u2019re constantly trying to figure out whom our audience is so if you have figured out how to classify your business, tell us on our Facebook<\/a> and Twitter<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cA \u2018small business,\u2019 also called \u2018mom and pop store\u2019 by some in the United States, is a business that is privately owned and operated, with a small number of employees and relatively low volume of sales. Small businesses are normally privately owned corporations, partnerships, or sole proprietorships. \u201c- Wikipedia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":1221,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,9],"tags":[352,445,753,1031],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1220"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1220\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.123print.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}