South Carolina Small Businesses: Five Fast Facts

May 15, 2024

Delaney Sexton
Contributing Editor

South Carolina Small Businesses: Five Fast Facts

There are 479,314 small businesses in South Carolina.
Banks issued $1.7 billion in loans to businesses with revenues of $1 million or less.
New lending through loans of $1 million or less was $4.9 billion.
44.6% of small businesses were women-owned, 21.1% were owned by racial minorities, 9% were veteran-owned, and 4.9% were Hispanic-owned.
South Carolina’s small business employment grew by 24.7% between 1996 and 2020, which exceeded the national small business employment growth rate.