Is Your Small Business Exporting?

The Wall St. Journal is reporting today on growth initiatives by the federal government in regard to trade imbalances. These goals are aimed squarely at a sector often left out in the export game: Small Business.

Very interesting article, and raises some questions we need to pass along:

• Do you know small businesses exporting?
• If not, why not?

The article, written by Sudeep Reddy, is excerpted below with continuation at the jump:
"U.S. trade officials are ramping up their export-growth initiative by targeting a key constituency that often feels left behind in the economic recovery: small businesses.

In an interview, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke said large U.S. corporations — which have vast marketing staffs around the world — already get “the full force of government” to help close contracts with governments and companies abroad.

But smaller firms haven’t gotten the same attention until recently, Locke said. Now they’ve become a central part of the Obama administration’s outreach effort as it aims to double American exports over five years. Expanding exports at U.S. firms would boost their sales and likely lead them to create more jobs, from engineering offices to factory floors.

'We need to help the small- and medium-sized companies,' he said. 'If they really want to grow their revenues and diversify their revenues, they need to look at the fact that 95% of the world’s consumers live outside the U.S.'

This month, several agencies — including Commerce, the Small Business Administration, Export-Import Bank and the United States Trade Representative — launched a nationwide tour to visit cities around the U.S. and work with local governments and nonprofits to encourage smaller companies to export.  They carry a key set of statistics: Only 1% of U.S. companies export, and 58% of those firms export to just one country, typically to Canada or Mexico. The officials are trying to get smaller firms connected with the U.S. export machine, such as the Export-Import Bank, which provides financing for firms looking to export and can guarantee payments by foreign buyers." read more