‘My Income Has Dropped to Zero’: About 45 Percent of Small Businesses Risk Closure Within Months At least 13.9 million of the nation’s small businesses are at serious risk of shuttering their doors by April 1, a recent industry report found. Forty-four percent of the country’s 31.7 million small businesses are at risk of closing by the end of the first quarter, according to small business group Alignable. Small businesses on the brink of closure expect to earn less revenue than their owners estimate is needed to stay afloat. “Customer confidence in their future cash flow is low right now,” a surveyed small business owner said, according to Alignable. “And so discretionary spending, which our business is based on, is significantly restricted. We need customer confidence to elevate to bring them back and make them feel comfortable spending their money.”