Over 7 in 10 of UK small and medium UK businesses (SMEs) remain positive about trading after Christmas despite the significant challenges created by the coronavirus pandemic according to CIMA's latest economic recovery survey. Despite the crisis, one in four businesses (26%) plan to hire new employees and 40% expect to retain their workforce in this period.  

However, revenue for SMEs has been down 6.6% on average over the last six months, with smaller businesses (organisations with 10-19 employees) being the worst hit with revenue down 13.1% on average. In addition, a third of SMEs (33%) expect to make some employees redundant in the next three months. 

The research further highlighted that SMEs have been quick to adapt to the disrupted environment with two thirds (68%) of SMEs saying that they had to rethink their business model. Changes in their business model include reducing their product or service range (32%), changing their supply chains (30%), and transforming their sales and marketing strategy to directly target customers (28%). 

Read the full survey report here.