Main Street news and trends

White-Glove FinTech Targets Small Business Cash Flow and Back-Office Pain
B2B Payments // July 13, 2026

Small businesses do not need another financial dashboard. They need someone to notice that cash is running low before payroll is due, that a customer is paying later than usual or that too much money is sitting idle in the wrong account. Small and medium-sized...

Small Businesses Inherit Big Business Money Problems
SMBs // July 01, 2026

Large corporations and small businesses aren’t the same. The most obvious difference is sheer scale, but the knock-on effects of that scale have effectively erected an operational wall between what the world’s multinational enterprises do for their day-to-day growth and what a domestic Main Street...

Payments Power the Real SMB Transformation as AI Arrives on Main Street
SMBs // June 12, 2026

The conventional logic has always been that small businesses had smaller needs than their enterprise peers. But with Google this week launching new enterprise-grade artificial intelligence (AI) tools designed for small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), a move that follows on the heels of Anthropic’s Claude...

Small Businesses Face Big Business M&A Rules
SMBs // June 02, 2026

Small businesses should think big when preparing for a sale. Like a big business, that is. Across the United States, Main Street is entering one of the largest ownership transitions in modern business history. Millions of small and medium-sized business (SMB) owners are approaching retirement...

Interviews & Exclusives
57% of SMBs Now Sell Through Their Own Websites

August 24, 2026
Small businesses increasingly see growth coming from the digital channels that extend their reach without requiring another storefront. The PYMNTS Intelligence report “Why Main Street’s Digital Survivors Are Pulling Ahead: Four Years of Small Business Data” draws on 23 surveys conducted from July 2022 through February 2026. It finds that most small and medium-sized businesses […]

Small Businesses Inherit Big Business Money Problems

July 01, 2026
Large corporations and small businesses aren’t the same. The most obvious difference is sheer scale, but the knock-on effects of that scale have effectively erected an operational wall between what...

Small Businesses Face Big Business M&A Rules

June 02, 2026
Small businesses should think big when preparing for a sale. Like a big business, that is. Across the United States, Main Street is entering one of the largest ownership transitions...

How Digitally Fluent Small Businesses Are Reshaping Main Street

May 13, 2026
Four years after the pandemic pushed millions of small businesses into emergency digital adoption, a new reality is taking shape across Main Street. The businesses that successfully digitized are increasingly...

Quick Reads
New Square AI Agent Automates Daily Tasks for Main Street Sellers

April 28, 2026
Square is now offering an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered “intelligent business agent” built into Square Dashboard to a select group of sellers in open beta. The new Managerbot is the next evolution of the Square AI that was launched last year, and it is available in open beta to most non-franchise food and beverage, retail, and health and beauty U.S. […]

Tariffs Drive Wedge Between Small Business and Big Tech

August 03, 2025
It was a strong quarter for America’s biggest companies — less so for many under-the-radar firms. That’s according to a report Saturday (Aug. 2) by the Financial Times (FT), which...

Merchants Blame Taxes as Small Business Optimism Dips

July 08, 2025
The most taxing problem facing America’s small businesses? Taxes. That’s according to the latest findings from the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) optimism index, released Tuesday (July 8). The organization’s monthly report showed...

Tariff Uncertainty Sparks Unease Among US Businesses

March 11, 2025
The White House’s tariff efforts continue to sow worry on both Wall Street and Main Street. As Reuters reported Tuesday (March 11), President Donald Trump’s shifting trade policies have sparked caution among...