The 2018 State of Women-Owned Businesses report examines the periods 2007, 2012, 2017 and 2018, looking at trends in the number of firms, employment, and revenue by various groupings.
This report focuses on women-owned businesses, which are defined as businesses that are at least 51% owned, operated, and controlled by one or more females. Over the past 46 years, women of all ages have become business owners in droves - from baby boomers and Gen Xers to millennials and even Gen Z.
The number of women-owned businesses increased a dramatic 31 times between 1972 and 2018, rising from 402,000 (4.6% of all firms) in 1972 to 12.3 million (40% of all firms) in 2018. Employment surged from 230,000 to 9.2 million, growing 40-fold. Revenues rose from $8.1
billion (representing 0.3% of all firms revenue) in 1972 to $1.8 trillion (4.3% of total firms revenue) in 2018 — a breathtaking multiple of 217.