Three out of four family businesses increased their turnover in 2018

Three out of four family businesses increased their turnover in 2018

64% of this type of companies also increased their staff last year, eleven points above the European average

  Family businesses begin to feel the end of the crisis and to live the first years of the good progress of the economy after difficult times. This is revealed on Monday by the European Barometer of Family Business developed by KPMG, which reveals that three of every four family businesses has increased its turnover in the last twelve months. In addition, in terms of employment, 64% of these entrepreneurs claim to have expanded their workforce in 2018 . These figures are very positive, as it increases by 5% last year and comfortably exceeds the European average, which only reach 53%.

  Returning to turnover, the number of companies (74%) that have increased this year is four points higher than in 2017 and "significantly" higher than 64% of the European average . At this point the report highlights that Spain has been the country that has shown the best results in terms of turnover, followed by Italy and France, both with 72%.

Despite the positive outlook, there are also uncertainties about these companies, such as the maintenance of profitability (42% of respondents), the difficulty in finding suitable profiles for their job offers (38%) or even political uncertainty ( 35%). In addition, as a direct consequence of the recovery of the Spanish economy, the promotion of the search for foreign markets has declined. Thus, 64% of family businesses say they have increased their activity abroad in the last year, six points less than in 2017.

Another positive data is that eight out of ten say they have confidence in the situation of their family business for 2019 , compared to 73% of European companies.