Houston Business Barometer Week 1: Most Working from Home, Nearly Half Say Outlook has Worsened

Published Apr 09, 2020 by A.J. Mistretta

The pressure facing local small businesses continues to mount as social distancing measures and stay home orders necessary to stop the spread of COVID-19 approach mid-April.

A total of 90 small business member companies of the Greater Houston Partnership responded to the first Houston Business Barometer survey conducted by the organization between April 3-6. An overwhelming majority of respondents (84.3%) said they have instituted work-from-home practices in their company while 22.5% have shut down whole or partial operations.

Thirty-six percent of responding companies said they had enacted a hiring freeze and 56.7% indicated their revenues have declined since their last billing cycle.

When asked about their firm’s short-term outlook during the week that ended April 6 compared with the previous week, 48.9% indicated it had gotten worse and another 44.4% said there was no change.

Asked how the fallout from the pandemic has impacted their operations, 53.3% said their operations have been severely impacted while 28.9% said the impact has been moderate.

Respondent firms’ top three concerns were revenue/sales (86.5%), employee well-being (59.6%) and profits (58.4%).

The following breaks down how long firms believe they could remain afloat based on projected cash flow and without federal assistance:

Time Period Respondents
1-2 weeks 0.0%
3-4 weeks 6.7%
5-6 weeks 6.7%
7-8 weeks 12.2%
3-6 months 26.7%
Longer than 6 months 40.0%
Don’t know 7.8%

Visit the Partnership's COVID-19 Resource page for updates, guidance for employers and more information. And sign up for daily email alerts from the Partnership as the situation develops.