A new survey from the Indiana Chamber of Commerce said the majority of Hoosier business leaders are seeing a major impact from the COVID-19 pandemic. Nearly 1,400 business leaders responded to the survey, called Indiana’s Road to Economy Recovery, which also touched on challenges for businesses to return to normal and how long businesses could survive under the current restrictions.
This story by Alex Brown originally appeared in Inside INdiana Business.
Additionally, the chamber has submitted specific return-to-work recommendations to Governor Eric Holcomb and his economic recovery team.
The survey asked respondents to rank the impact of the pandemic on their businesses on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the most impact. The chamber says 56 percent ranked the impact on their own business at 8, 9, or 10. The average of all respondents was 7.24.
The chamber says the biggest impacts noted in the survey were revenue loss (80 percent), cash flow concerns (51 percent), suspended operations (34 percent) and employee layoffs (32 percent).
The survey also asked when respondents thought businesses should resume operations. The chamber says 33 percent said “after May 1,” another 33 percent said “when more widespread testing has taken place,” and of the 26 percent in the “other” category, the predominant response was “as soon as possible.”
The respondents also listed among the challenges of returning to normal: customer retention (48 percent), finances (46 percent), personnel (38 percent) and supply chain (32 percent).
