Press Release
Small, Mid-Sized Businesses Expect Banner Year
2005 Good – 2006 Better: Avalara SMB-Market Survey
Bainbridge Island, Washington – December 14, 2005: In a just-completed survey of 12,000 small and mid-sized business (SMB) owners and operators, Avalara has learned that SMBs are coming off a year of solid performance, and that most of these SMB owners expect an even better year in 2006. Seventy-Four percent of respondents to Avalara’s web-based survey feel that the US economy was strong in 2005, and 72 percent think that the US economy in 2006 will be better than 2005. Avalara (http://www.avalara.com) – the SMB sales tax solution provider – commissioned this wide-ranging survey to look at SMB-market business performance in 2005 – and to anticipate SMB business performance in 2006.
Avalara also asked these SMB business owners and operators to rate their own businesses, and found that they were more upbeat about their own performance than they were about the national economy. Of those who took Avalara’s survey, 84 percent say that their own business did better in 2005 than it did in 2004, and an equal number saw their business again improving in 2006 over 2005. More than 12,000 owners and operators of small and mid-sized businesses were invited to participate.
“SMB-market business owners seem remarkably upbeat about the American economy,” Avalara Chairman and CEO Jared Vogt said. “Because we are the only SMB-focused sales tax calculation service, it’s important to know what our clients and prospects think of the economy in general, and their own business in particular.
“This is a strong indicator of our own growth,” Vogt observed. “Since we serve our clients on demand, on a per-transaction basis, both of these are significant for Avalara. For Avalara, growth has been dramatic in 2005 – the Company has grown from little more than a visionary start-up a year ago into a company that had more than 1,400 licensed users at the start of December, and expects to finish the year with more than 1,500 client licenses outstanding.
The Avalara survey was conducted during the last half of November, using research tools provided by Zoomerang.com. “Because we provide our services in a web-based, on-demand environment,” Vogt said, “we chose to conduct our survey online as well.” Avalara’s survey used a contact base of more than 12,000 opt-in registered SMB-market business owners and operators, and achieved a nearly one percent response rate.
About AvaTax ST™
An SMB market-leading, Web-service-based sales tax solution, AvaTax ST instantly and accurately calculates sales tax for clients in any of the more than 8,000 taxing jurisdictions in North America. provides detailed, real-time reporting and automatically generates pre-populated returns.
AvaTax ST is the most comprehensive, full-service, automated sales tax solution in the world, eliminating forever the need for Avalara’s clients to do rate lookups, tax detail research and tax schedule creation. AvaTax ST makes the hassle of filing returns and remittance go away too. AvaTax ST performs all of these tasks, and does so more affordably than any other solution on the market today. AvaTax ST comes integrated with SMB financial applications serving more businesses than any other solution on the market today, including Intuit’s QuickBooks, Sage Software’s Sage MAS 90 ERP, Sage MAS 200 ERP, Sage MAS 500 ERP and Sage Accpac ERP; Epicor’s iScala; and Great Plains and Navision® from Microsoft Business Solutions. Additionally, with AvaTax On-Demand™ developers can integrate Avalara’s sales tax Web service with any e-commerce, third party or custom-build solution with use of a comprehensive Software Developer’s Kit (SDK).
About Avalara
Headquartered on Bainbridge Island near Seattle, Washington, Avalara is changing the sales tax landscape by delivering innovative and affordable solutions to small and mid-sized businesses. Avalara’s mission is to transform the tax process for our clients by creating cost-effective, state-of-the-art solutions. Avalara does so through integrated on-demand, Web-based services that provide transparent transactions, accurate tax compliance, painless administration and effortless reporting.
Additional news and information is available at www.avalara.com
For more information about Avalara, contact:
Ned Barnett, ned@barnettmarcom.com, 702-696-1200
Daryl Toor, dtoor@attentiongroup.com, 770-777-9489
