[IP2]

The press is full of misery, large companies are legitimately being able to reduce profit forecasts without causing shareholder panic...

But what is your view on the economy in the next 12 months? Do you see your business growing, staying static or retracting in the coming year?

Do you see the economic change as an opportunity? And if not, how are you looking to change your business model to cope?

[Indizine]

I havent noticed any change and things are going from strenth to strength for me. Business wont come to a standstill it just means we have to compete harder for the custom.

My son got made redundant the other day due to the credit crunch so its deifnately affecting some more than others.

[Alvin]

Well different effects on different products.

I see the car spares being busier as people keep there cars longer.

Luxury and none essentials taking a slight dive.

Housing should be interesting.

We are starting a new project involving shipping,which should help us weather the storm.

Can't say any more about it yet.But quite exciting.

Alvin

[Alvin]

Originally Posted by Indizine

I havent noticed any change and things are going from strenth to strength for me. Business wont come to a standstill it just means we have to compete harder for the custom.

My son got made redundant the other day due to the credit crunch so its deifnately affecting some more than others.

Sorry to hear that.

I have great sympathy with youngsters starting off in this day and age.

When I was young there was a job on every corner.

Alvin

[KingPin]

For my e-commerce sites I have seen no "major" drop at all. Of course I took into account for seasonal trends.

Will business drop? not sure but at the moment with the opening of a UK media company and taking of 6 staff members, business is on the up. Since I decided to move into the small businesses market too, we have about 60 clients lined up ready to go.

How will business be in the next 12 months? no idea!!

KP

[An Oasis]

Upper end of the market is thriving both commercially and individuals. Bottom end same as last year. It is the middle sector which is cutting back, more especially highly competitive areas with low profit margins, they really seem to be feeling the pinch.

[Maxine]

Well I guess I am a bit lucky with two of my businesses in that sales and debt recovery are quite popular when cash is tight but also surprised that our plumbing and plastering business busier now than ever too.

I am getting a lot of calls from people looking for work and customers are becoming very picky and asking for money off at any opportunity with some of these giving "credit crunch" as a reason!!! (for goodness sake! - how that should change our pricing after the event I am not sure!?)

I also unfortunately had a very good member of staff leave for more money elsewhere and I am pretty sad about that but it would have been wrong for me to increase salary for the sake of it.

I think we are attracting more types of customers that I wouldnt normally attract and customers seem to want to shop around a lot more for quotes and reassurance on different aspects of the service provided and guarantees for work etc but we are getting more work than ever.

I wonder if it hasn't really hit properly yet and whether we are around 12 months away from the real crunch??

[KingPin]

Just on a different note but still same topic. I was out with a few friends last night and we were chatting about this. One of them owns a company and was saying that he is thinking about going bankrupt.


I couldn't help but think what a perfect time to do that and using the credit crunch as an excuse.

I wonder if we'll see more business go bankrupt this year and over the next 12 months?

KP

[Paul Norman]

This is an interesting thread. There are two seperate questions in a way, though they are linked.

1. confidence in the economy?..for me, low. Mainly, because I dont see any strong direction setting from national leaders, who, for me, demonstrate a woeful lack of understanding of macro economic issues.
2. Our economy cannot be unaffected by destabilising influences of a global nature, such as the oil prices, and the pain in the sub prime lending markets. The supply of global money will slow.
3. Your business, and mine? This depends what we do and how well we do it. Economic downturn does not guaruntee that an individual business cannot thrive. It does test our abilities though, and it does present opportunities for some sectors. A classic example of this is Alvin's motor spares comment.

The fact is, people have less disposable money, and businesses will get twitchy. However, we should not panic!