DOVER—
Dover area business leaders are optimistic about the economy, their own companies’ performance, and even profitability — but had a more guarded optimism about job growth, according to results of the Second Quarter Economic Pulse Survey completed recently.
The Economic Pulse Survey, a joint effort by the Dover Chamber and the City of Dover’s Economic Development Department, found that 53.1% of respondents believe that business conditions will improve in the next three months and 62% believe that sales in their own companies will improve in the third quarter of 2010.
“With our local economy and the rest of the State in much better shape than elsewhere in the country, the response of our local business community seems to reflect optimism for stability and continuing improvement over the next few months,” commented Dover City Manager, Mike Joyal. “Clearly, the marketing efforts by the Chamber and DBIDA (Dover Business and Industrial Development Authority) in support of local businesses and promotional impact of community events coordinated by the Chamber are seen as positives by many of the respondents.”
This first report, which will follow one month after the end of every quarter so that trend data can be evaluated, was distributed to 800 business contacts in the greater Dover area over the past two weeks. Over 65% of the respondents represented businesses with 20 or fewer employees - a ‘real bellwether of the state of Dover’s business climate,’ according to Chamber Executive Director, Kirt Schuman.
“Some of the things we heard during our Federal Savings Bank Economic Forecast are beginning to become true,” commented Schuman. “The experts at that event called for modest growth through 2010 and at least from our respondents, this has held true in most cases. Coupled with a strong promotional effort from the Chamber we are looking forward to helping our members and the community have a strong second half.”
Only 4.2% expected a bleaker outlook for the next three months with 8% indicating the expected modest declines in their sales during the third quarter of 2010.
The results proved that job growth is not yet wide-spread, as typical in the beginning of an economic recovery. Larger companies reported that hiring has begun, however 26% indicated that their headcounts would remain static over the next three months. Interestingly, 35% of respondents indicated that their headcounts would grow by 1 to 4 in the next three months, while another 33% indicated they would reduce headcount by 1 to 4 employees.
Dover’s Economic Development Director, Dan Barufaldi, pointed out that, “Dover has weathered the past few years remarkably well, currently our unemployment rate is 5.0% about .7% better than NH Average and well below the almost 10% nationwide average.”
“In 2010, things are starting to slowly turn towards the positive. Dover has seen 13 new businesses bringing over 250 new jobs to the city,” continued Barufaldi.
Of written responses, access to credit, a soft housing market and downtown parking remained top issues that business leaders felt impacted their profitability.
“We expect this survey to be a great tool for us to focus our efforts,” commented Schuman. “Based on some of the comments, we are already looking at making some changes to some of the parking signage in the downtown.”
Dover area business leaders are optimistic about the economy, their own companies’ performance, and even profitability — but had a more guarded optimism about job growth, according to results of the Second Quarter Economic Pulse Survey completed recently.
The Economic Pulse Survey, a joint effort by the Dover Chamber and the City of Dover’s Economic Development Department, found that 53.1% of respondents believe that business conditions will improve in the next three months and 62% believe that sales in their own companies will improve in the third quarter of 2010.
“With our local economy and the rest of the State in much better shape than elsewhere in the country, the response of our local business community seems to reflect optimism for stability and continuing improvement over the next few months,” commented Dover City Manager, Mike Joyal. “Clearly, the marketing efforts by the Chamber and DBIDA (Dover Business and Industrial Development Authority) in support of local businesses and promotional impact of community events coordinated by the Chamber are seen as positives by many of the respondents.”
This first report, which will follow one month after the end of every quarter so that trend data can be evaluated, was distributed to 800 business contacts in the greater Dover area over the past two weeks. Over 65% of the respondents represented businesses with 20 or fewer employees - a ‘real bellwether of the state of Dover’s business climate,’ according to Chamber Executive Director, Kirt Schuman.
“Some of the things we heard during our Federal Savings Bank Economic Forecast are beginning to become true,” commented Schuman. “The experts at that event called for modest growth through 2010 and at least from our respondents, this has held true in most cases. Coupled with a strong promotional effort from the Chamber we are looking forward to helping our members and the community have a strong second half.”
Only 4.2% expected a bleaker outlook for the next three months with 8% indicating the expected modest declines in their sales during the third quarter of 2010.
The results proved that job growth is not yet wide-spread, as typical in the beginning of an economic recovery. Larger companies reported that hiring has begun, however 26% indicated that their headcounts would remain static over the next three months. Interestingly, 35% of respondents indicated that their headcounts would grow by 1 to 4 in the next three months, while another 33% indicated they would reduce headcount by 1 to 4 employees.
Dover’s Economic Development Director, Dan Barufaldi, pointed out that, “Dover has weathered the past few years remarkably well, currently our unemployment rate is 5.0% about .7% better than NH Average and well below the almost 10% nationwide average.”
“In 2010, things are starting to slowly turn towards the positive. Dover has seen 13 new businesses bringing over 250 new jobs to the city,” continued Barufaldi.
Of written responses, access to credit, a soft housing market and downtown parking remained top issues that business leaders felt impacted their profitability.
“We expect this survey to be a great tool for us to focus our efforts,” commented Schuman. “Based on some of the comments, we are already looking at making some changes to some of the parking signage in the downtown.”
