The American Main Street Economy Will be Rebuilt on Tech

The SMB (Small Medium Business) main street was devastated in 2020 due to the Pandemic, economic issues and government enforced lockdowns. At least 100,000 small businesses have shut down this year. 

But out of the ashes we will see the green shoots of new business life emerge. And surprisingly in 2020, due to many company closures and job losses, we’ve seen a 40% increase of new business registrations in the USA over 2019. A very unexpectedly quick blossoming (to me) of new SMB businesses. And all of them will be built by embracing technology and leveraging all the new tech tools that have emerged over the last decade and half. 

Jeff Richards of top tier venture capital firm GGV  said it best. 

"the SMBTech stack is the new Main St storefront.

Think about it – if you were launching a new restaurant today, would you do so without mobile ordering, pickup and delivery via Slice, Toast, DoorDash or another technology platform? If you were launching a women’s clothing boutique, would you do so without an ecommerce presence on BigCommerce, Shopify, Etsy or Poshmark? Or if you were opening an outdoor gear rental business would you do without a POS system from Square or a web site from Wix? Today in almost every vertical there are SMBTech platforms like Brightwheel and ServiceTitan offering “operating systems” for SMBs.

Every single new company formed in every single industry will start with the question of “What technology do I need to launch and grow my business?” This is a trend that started a decade ago and will accelerate at an unprecedented pace over the next 6-12 months."

Jeff adds that “In general, think peeps are underestimating the depth and breadth of digital shift.” Every new Small business in the future will be omnichannel by default. We should definitely expect a major Renaissance in SMB mainstreet retail space. This is something worth celebrating.