Starting a small business? We have rounded up some of the best collections of small business quotes, sayings, messages, status, and captions (with images and pictures) to encourage small business owners and motivate them to keep fighting against all odds they face in setting up their businesses.
Small businesses are corporations, sole proprietorships, or partnerships that have less number of employees or have less annual turnover/revenue than a regular-sized business.
Also See: Quotes About Business Growth
Small businesses may include retail or service operations such as grocery stores, convenience stores, bakeries, motels, restaurants, or small-scale manufacturing. There are few professionals who operate as small businesses, such as accountants, lawyers, and dentists.
Starting a new venture or start-up can be a daunting task for anyone but with some courage and passion for your idea, you can easily do so.
As a small business owner, you might face a lot of challenges and obstacles that you might have to overcome. From working for longer hours to not having anyone to guide them, entrepreneurs of small businesses face these problems in their regular business model.
These best small business quotes for business owners will help you to deal with the highs and lows, ups and downs of entrepreneurship, and will give you the much-needed motivation to keep your passion going.
These motivational quotes are divided into these sections;
- Encouraging Small Business Quotes
- Inspirational Quotes For Small Business Owners
- Positive Small Business Quotes For Local
- Support Small Business Quotes
- Small Business Entrepreneur Quotes
Don’t forget to check our collection of business women quotes and integrity quotes for work and business for work, business, and personal life.
Encouraging Small Business Quotes
- “Small business, big ambitions.”
- “SMALL BUSINESS. BIG HEART.”
- “Big things often have small beginnings.” – Unknown
- “Behind every small business is a family.” – Unknown
- “It’s not always easy, but it’s always worth it.”
- “A big business starts small.” – Richard Branson
- “May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.”
- “Opportunities don’t happen. You create them.” – Chris Grosser
- “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.” – Theodore Roosevelt
- “I never dreamed about success – I worked for it.” – Estee Lauder
- “When you support a small business, you are supporting a dream.”
- “When someone says you can’t do it. Do it twice, and take pictures.”
- “Education costs money. But then so does ignorance.” – Sir Claus Moser
- “Wonder what your customer really wants? Ask. Don’t tell.” – Lisa Stone
- “A person who is quietly confident makes the best leader.” – Fred Wilson
- “In order to succeed, we must first believe that we can.” – Nikos Kazantzakis
- “A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business.” – Henry Ford
- “You do not get what you want. You get what you negotiate.” – Harvey Maday
- “It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.” – Confucius
- “Repetition makes reputation and reputation makes customers.” – Elizabeth Arden
- “To build a successful business, you must start small and dream big.” – Aliko Dangote
- “Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.” – Albert Einstein
- “I’ve always believed that if you put in the work, the results will come.” – Michael Jordan
- “You don’t build a business, you build people, then people build the business.” – Zig Ziglar
- “Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.” – Henry David Thoreau
- “Risk more than others think is safe. Dream more than others think is practical.” – Howard Schultz
- “If people like you, they’ll listen to you, but if they trust you, they’ll do business with you.” – Zig Ziglar
- “A small business is an amazing way to serve and leave an impact on the world you live in.” – Nicole Snow
- “The Golden Rule for Every Business is this: Put Yourself in your Customer’s Place.” – Orison Swett Marden
- “Small businesses are the heartbeat of your neighborhood, the spine of your local economy, and spirit of your town.”
- “When you find an idea that you just can’t stop thinking about, that’s probably a good one to pursue.” – Josh James
- “Some people dream of success, while other people get up every morning and make it happen.” – Wayne Huizenga
- “Work 9-to-5, spend a couple of hours with your family, 7 to 2am is plenty of time to do damage.” – Gary Vaynerchuk
- “Running that first shop taught me business is not financial science; it’s about trading. Buying and selling.” – Anita Roddick
- “Small business isn’t for the faint of heart. It’s for the brave, the patient, and the persistent. It’s for the overcomer.” – Unknown
- “Entrepreneurship is living a few years of your life most people won’t so you can spend the rest of your life like most people can’t.” – Warren G. Tracy’s
- “When we do what we are meant to do, money comes to us, doors open for us, we feel useful, and the work we do feels like play to us.” – Julia Cameron
- “If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
- “Your smile is your logo. Your personality is your business card. How you leave others feeling after an experience with you becomes your trademark.” – Jay Danzie
- “Easy ways to support a small businesses: Follow, comment, like their social media, tell your friends, don’t ask for a discount, buy from them, leave a review, cheer them on.”
Inspirational Quotes For Small Business Owners
In every business undertaking, especially small businesses, motivation is very important to keep the business running.
From the establishment to the accomplishment of the set goals motivation within small businesses is very essential. To run the business smoothly it is essential to come up with various strategies and keep up with the tight competition.
Also Check: Mind Your Own Business Quotes
Ambitious and passionate people are always willing to start a small business. The best things entrepreneurs of small businesses are independence and freedom. You don’t work for someone else but for your own profit. This gives you the motivation to work hard and for longer hours.
Also Check: Work Hard Quotes
These famous small business quotes for customers will encourage you to stay focused and motivated in times of doubt, frustration, and fear of failure.
- “If you can dream it, you can do it.” – Walt Disney
- “Satisfaction is a rating. Loyalty is a brand.” – Shep Hyken
- “The biggest risk is not taking any risk.” – Mark Zuckerberg
- “Make the customer the hero of your story.” – Ann Handley
- “To win big, you sometimes have to take big risks.” – Bill Gates
- “A goal without a plan is just a wish.” – Antoine De Saint-Exupery
- “The only way to do great work is to love what you do.” – Steve Jobs
- “There are no working hours for leaders.” – James Cardinal Gibbons
- “The best way to predict the future is to create it.” – Peter F. Drucker
- “By failing to prepare you are preparing to fail.” – Benjamin Franklin
- “It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.” – Scott Belsky
- “Great things in business are never done by one person.” – Steve Jobs
- “Don’t follow the crowd, let the crowd follow you.” – Margaret Thatcher
- “The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” – Walt Disney
- “Listen to your customers deeply, or you will have none.” – Bryan Clayton
- “A satisfied customer is the best business strategy of all.” – Michael LeBoeuf
- “First, think. Second, believe. Third, dream. And finally, dare.” – Walt Disney
- “Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.” – John D. Rockefeller
- “To be successful, you must act big, think big and talk big.” – Aristotle Onassis
- “The goal isn’t more money. The goal is living life on your terms.” – Will Rogers
- “I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.” – Thomas Jefferson
- “Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.” – Bill Gates
- “If you don’t drive your business, you will be driven out of business.” – B.C. Forbes
- “If you look closely, most overnight successes took a really long time.” – Steve Jobs
- “Success is how high you bounce after you hit bottom.” – General George Patton Jr.
- “You never achieve real success unless you like what you are doing.” – Dale Carnegie
- “The best preparation for tomorrow is doing your best today.” – H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
- “The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams.” – Michael Jordan
- “Don’t find customers for your products, find products for your customers.” – Seth Godin
- “If we did all the things we were capable of, we would astound ourselves” – Thomas Edison
- “Get five or six of your smartest friends in a room and ask them to rate your idea.” – Mark Pincus
- “Patience: This is the greatest business asset. Wait for the right time to make your moves.” – J. Paul Getty
- “The goal as a company is to have customer service that is not just the best, but legendary.” – Sam Walton
- “The most successful entrepreneurs I know are optimistic. It’s part of the job description.” – Caterina Fake
- “Never Give up. Today is hard and tomorrow will be Worse, but the day after Tomorrow will be Sunshine.” – Jack Ma
- “Bringing great people onto your team is about demonstrating that size really doesn’t matter – people do.” -Jess Campbell
- “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas Edison
- “It is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the most responsive to change.” – Charles Darwin
- “If you just work on stuff that you like and you’re passionate about, you don’t have to have a master plan with how things will play out.” – Mark Zuckerberg
- “If you look at history, innovation doesn’t come just from giving people incentives; it comes from creating environments where their ideas can connect.” – Steven Johnson
Positive Small Business Quotes For Local
Small businesses bring innovation and growth to the community contributing to the local economies. They provide employment opportunities to locals who may not be employed by big companies. Small businesses attract talent who invent new products and solutions. Big businesses also benefit from small businesses through outsourcing within the same local community.
Also Check: Perseverance Quotes
Small businesses contribute a lot to the economy. Entrepreneurs of small ventures contribute a lot to the state budget. These quotes about small business growth will inspire you to keep going even when the going gets tough.
- “A winner never stops trying.” – Tom Landry
- “Capital isn’t scarce. Vision is.” – Sam Walton
- “Make a Customer, Not a sale.” – Katherine Barchetti
- “An obstacle is often a stepped stone.” – William Prescott
- “Fall seven times and stand up eight.” – Japanese proverb
- “Don’t deliver a product, deliver an experience.” – Unknown
- “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.” – Mark Twain
- “Don’t count the days, Make the days count.” – Muhammad Ali
- “It’s not an experiment if you know it’s going to work.” – Jeff Bezos
- “Don’t give up, the beginning is always the hardest.” – Kemmy Nola
- “Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.” – Sam Levenson
- “Stop chasing the money and start chasing the passion.” – Tony Hsieh
- “Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.” – Steve Jobs
- “Minds are like parachutes; they work best when open.” – Thomas Dewar
- “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.” – Drew Houston
- “Money won’t create success, the freedom to make it will.” – Nelson Mandela
- “The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus.” – Bruce Lee
- “The price of inaction is far greater than the cost of a mistake.” – Meg Whitman
- “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.” – Henry Ford
- “Small opportunities are often beginning of great achievements.” – Demosthenes
- “You don’t need to have a 100–person company to develop that idea.” – Larry Page
- “Success is the sum of small efforts – repeated day in and day out.” – Robert Collier
- “Setting Goal is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible.” – Tony Robbins
- “Chase the vision, not the money, the money will end up following you.” – Tony Hsieh
- “The secret of success is to do the common thing uncommonly well.” – John D. Rockefeller
- “When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hang on.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt
- “You must not only aim right but draw the bow with all your might.” – Henry David Thoreau
- “Customer service is an opportunity to exceed your customer’s expectations.” – John Jantsch
- “It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.” – Bill Gates
- “If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.” – Ken Robinson
- “The biggest mistake a small business can make is to think like a small business.” – Aruna Bhayana
- “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” – Winston Churchill
- “Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” – Warren Buffett
- “Make something people want” includes making a company that people want to work for.” – Sahil Lavingia
- “To be successful you have to have your heart in your business and your business in your heart.” – Thomas J. Watson
- “Business is all about relationships, how well you build them determines how well they build your business.” – Brad Sugars
- “You can’t ask customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.” – Steve Jobs
- “If you make customers unhappy in the physical world, they might each tell six friends. If you make customers unhappy on the internet, they can each tell 6,000.” – Jeff Bezos
- “The only way you survive is you continuously transform into something else. It’s this idea of continuous transformation that makes you an innovation company.” – Ginni Rometty
- “Without change there is no innovation, creativity or incentive for improvement. Those who initiate change will have a better opportunity to manage the change that is inevitable.” – William Pollard
Support Small Business Quotes
- “Don’t find fault. Find a remedy.” – Henry Ford
- “Go out on a limb. That’s where the fruit is.” – Jimmy Carter
- “In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” – Albert Einstein
- “The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” – Lao Tzu
- “Tough times never last, but tough people do.” – Robert H. Schuller
- “Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.” – Helen Keller
- “It’s not how far you fall, but how high you bounce that counts.” – Zig Ziglar
- “The heart and soul of a company is creativity and innovation.” – Robert Iger
- “If you are not taking care of your customer, your competitor will.” – Bob Hooey
- “Your value will be not what you know; it will be what you share.” – Ginni Rometty
- “Always give your best effort even when the odds are against you.” – Arnold Palmer
- “If you don’t understand the details of your business you are going to fail.” – Jeff Bezos
- “Plan for what it is difficult while it is easy, Do what is great while it is small.” – Sun Tzu
- “Have the end in mind and every day make sure you’re working towards it.” – Ryan Allis
- “One way to keep momentum going is to have constantly greater goals.” – Michael Korda
- “The well-satisfied customer will bring the repeat sale that counts.” – James Cash Penney
- “Great customer service is a critical competitive advantage for a business.” – Steve Benson
- “Courteous treatment will make a customer a walking advertisement.” – James Cash Penny
- “Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” – Richard Branson
- “When you serve the customer better, they always return on your investment.” – Arnold Palmer
- “There’s nothing wrong with staying small. You can do big things with a small team.” – Jason Fried
- “If you don’t try at anything, you can’t fail. It takes backbone to lead the life you want.” – Richard Yates
- “The secret to successful hiring is this: look for the people who want to change the world.” – Marc Benioff
- “Continuous effort – not strength or intelligence – is the key to unlocking our potential.” – Winston Churchill
- “Timing, perseverance, and ten years of trying will eventually make you look like an overnight success.” – Biz Stone
- “Every company’s greatest assets are its customers because without customers there is no company.” – Michael LeBoeuf
- “The best customer service is if the customer doesn’t need to call you, doesn’t need to talk to you. It just works.” – Jeff Bezos
- “A big part of financial freedom is having your heart and mind free from worry about the what-ifs of life.” – Suze Orman
- “Know what your customer want most and what your company does best. Focus on where those two meet.” – Kevin Stirtz
- “Successful people do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do. Don’t wish it were easier; wish you were better.” – Jim Rohn
- “Success is the child of drudgery and perseverance. It cannot be coaxed or bribed; pay the price and it is yours.” – Orison Swett Mard
- “When everything seems to be going against you, remember that the airplane takes off against the wind, not with it.” – Henry Ford
- “Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they realize it themselves.” – Steve Jobs
- “Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” – Conrad Hilton
- “Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.” – Jack Welch
Small Business Entrepreneur Quotes
Small business entrepreneurs are independent and are free to make their own decisions. It gives them certain lifestyle advantages because they decide where and when they want to work. Business owners of small businesses have high financial rewards. They benefit from their own hard work.
If you like these quotations then check our posts on grind and hustle quotes and hard work always pays off quotes to inspire you to never give up and work harder towards achieving your goals.
- “Keep going, keep growing.”
- “You didn’t come this far to only come this far.”
- “Never give up. Great things take time.” – Unknown
- “Everything starts with the customer.” – Lou Gerstner
- “Action is the foundational key to all success.” – Pablo Picasso
- “Successful people never worry about what others are doing.”
- “Supporting another person’s success won’t ever dampen yours.”
- “Success is dependent upon the glands – sweat glands.” – Zig Ziglar
- “What you do today can improve all your tomorrows.” – Ralph Marston
- “There is no finish line. There are only mile markers.” – Michael Ventura
- “Never ever give up! Constant effort is the key to success.” – Xavier Davis
- “The secret of business is to know something that nobody else knows.” – Aristotle
- “What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” – Napoleon Hill
- “Failure is not to be feared. It is from failure that most growth comes.” – Dee Hock
- “If you have the courage to begin, you have the courage to succeed.” – David Viscott
- “Don’t spread yourself too thin… focus trumps freneticism any day.” – John Coleman
- “Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny.” – C.S. Lewis
- “All our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them.” – Walt Disney
- “The man who has confidence in himself gains the confidence of others.” – Hasidic Proverb
- “Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill
- “Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.” – OG Mandino
- “An entrepreneur is someone who has a vision for something and a want to create.” – David Karp
- “The best compliment you can get is a customer telling their friends and family about your business.”
- “Customers may forget what you said but they’ll never forget how you made them feel.” – Anonymous
- “There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: The fear of failure.” – Paulo Coelho
- “Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.” – Peter F. Drucker
- “Spend time upfront to invest in systems and processes to make long-term growth sustainable.” – Jeff Platt
- “Your Customer doesn’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” – Damon Richards
- “Customer don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” – Donald Porter
- “There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work and learning from failure.” – Colin Powell
- “Do not judge me by my success. Judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.” – Nelson Mandela
- “Where do you put the fear when you choose to innovate? The fear is there, but you have to find a place to put it.” – Seth Godin
- “Strength doesn’t come from what you can do. It comes from overcoming the things you once thought you couldn’t.” – Rikki Rogers
- “All success starts with one. One step. One client. One order. One sale. Your business may not be where you want it to be. It’s okay. Don’t give up. Continue to work hard and trust the process!”
- “When you buy from a small business, you are not helping a CEO buy a third vacation home. You are helping a little girl get dance lessons, a little boy get his team jersey, a mom put food on the table, a dad pay a mortgage or a student pay for college.” – Unknown
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Small companies and startups can come up against a lot of different problems in the first few years of business.
Some obstacles are harder to overcome than others. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 20% of small businesses fail by the end of the first year. With such survival rates, it’s not easy to start and maintain small businesses. But all these challenges can be fixed with some assessment and planning.
If you like these positive small business quotes and sayings then also check our posts on endurance quotes and work from home quotes to break the monotony and inspire you to work hard from home or from the office.
Let us know which of the above powerful quotes about small businesses you resonate the most with. If you have a quote that is not on the above list, please share it in the comments section below.
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