In order to understand the evolution of business owners’ retirement and succession planning during the pandemic, CFIB surveyed its members in March 2021. In fact, Canadian small business owners’ plan for retirement has been affected by COVID-19, as 42% of them say they will retire later due to COVID-19.
Most of them plan on selling to an unrelated buyer(s) (40%), employee(s) (15%) or selling/transferring to family (13%/12%).
When owners are selling their business, they are looking for more than just the highest possible price. In fact, 88% of them say it’s important to protect current employees, 87% want to get the highest price possible and 81% want to select a buyer who will carry forward their way of doing business.
The federal government could do more to make succession easier for Canadian small businesses. For example, in regards of employee ownership trusts, about 59% of entrepreneurs support adopting a similar approach to employee ownership as that which is used in the U.S. and U.K. In addition, 53% of business owners would be more likely to sell their business to their employees if a similar model for employee ownership was introduced in Canada.
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