In the first, frothy years of Poland's post-communist transformation, more than a million small businesses set up shop, selling everything from cosmetics to car accessories. The sector has produced extraordinary success stories.
Small and midsized enterprises (SMEs) remain a motor of Polish growth today, generating 50 per cent of GDP and two-thirds of jobs. But survival, not expansion, is on most companyies’ minds as they weather Poland's three-year-old economic downturn and depressed demand in Germany, its biggest trading partner.
In a survey of nearly 1,200 SMEs, published by the Polish Confederation of Private Employers in February, only 18 per cent reported a rise in profits over the previous two years, compared with 42.5 per cent who reported a decline. Slack markets aside, the companies' worries included financial bottlenecks and competition from Poland's large grey economy.
