Business closures outnumbered new startups in P.E.I. since 2024, says CFIB | CBC News
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Fewer people in Prince Edward Island are starting or taking over businesses, according to the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
“We’ve seen more closures than we’ve seen … new businesses being started,” Frédéric Gionet, the CFIB’s director of legislative affairs for Atlantic Canada, told CBC’s Island Morning.
From 2019 to 2023, he said, there were more businesses popping up each year. But since January 2024, there’s been a downward trend — around 1,300 businesses created, compared to 1,700 that closed during the same time.
Gionet said there are multiple reasons for the closures, adding that consumer demand is down lately.
“Our stats demonstrate that people are tightening their belts,” he said, adding that entrepreneurship can seem less attractive to people now, given economic uncertainty and supply chain pressures.
Island Morning7:06Island entrepreneur says it’s been a hard winter for his small business
The owner of an art studio and creative space in Montague is painting a bleak picture of business this winter. We chat with Patrick Guindon about the trials and tribulations of running a small business in a small town.
Patrick Guindon, owner-operator of Creative Rebel Studio in Montague, said he knows all too well the struggle of keeping a small business going on the Island.
The studio and shop, which has been open for three years, offers drop-in art sessions, classes and events.
But Guindon said business has not been as regular as expected.
“It’s been very quiet,” he said. “I’ve been sitting here mostly by myself pretty much every weekend.”
To keep the studio running, Guindon said he’s worked events and workshops off-site.
“These kinds of little injections of revenue helped to keep the lights on here,” he said, but added it may not be enough to keep the storefront open.
“It’s certainly discouraging and disheartening. I’m a former teacher. I’m looking at getting back on the supply teacher list so that I can just make sure that my family eats.”
Guindon said people are carefully choosing what they spend their money on — and when money is tight, art may not make the cut.
“I think part of it is just the financial reality,” he said. “As a father of four, I get it, absolutely. It’s hard to buy groceries, which sounds cliché, but is absolutely true.”
Similar trends Canada-wide
P.E.I. is far from the only province seeing small business closures.
By the third quarter of 2025, closure rates in Canada were rising at some of the most concerning levels in over a decade outside the COVID-19 pandemic, the CFIB said.
“If that trend continues, you could see some economic damage along the way,” Gionet said.
The federation is calling on provincial and federal governments to remove barriers to entrepreneurship that make it harder to start, scale or transition a business. That could include reducing tax pressures and unnecessary government processes that eat up owners’ time and delay permits.
“The entrepreneurs of today will become the employers of tomorrow,” Gionet said. “It’s very important to address this and to look at it in a more urgent fashion.”