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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, December 16, 2025

SBS CELEBRATES MILESTONES IN BUSINESSES SERVED, DOLLARS SAVED, NEW YORKERS HIRED, AND NEIGHBORHOOD INVESTMENTS SINCE START OF ADAMS ADMINISTRATION

Over 183,000 Small Businesses Now Operating in New York City

NEW YORK – Today, New York City Department of Small Business Services (SBS) Commissioner Dynishal Gross celebrated major milestones at the agency during 2025, as well as its major achievements under the tenure of New York City Mayor Eric Adams. Following initiatives like the Business Express Service Team (NYC BEST), Mayor Adams’s “Small Business Forward” Executive Order, and the city’s investments in workforce development and neighborhoods, the Adams administration has overseen four years of strong economic growth, with more than 183,000 small businesses in operation, the highest-ever in New York City’s history. With 4.8 million total jobs in New York City, the administration has also broken the all-time high jobs record 12 times and recovered 100 percent of pre-pandemic private-sector jobs.

“We took office with a simple promise: to ‘Get Stuff Done,’ and, four years later, our administration can say we delivered that every day for working-class New Yorkers,” said New York City Mayor Adams. “We drove shootings to record lows and pushed jobs and small businesses to record highs. We rewrote the playbook on homelessness and mental health to finally get New Yorkers living on our streets the help they need, and, after decades of half-measures, passed historic housing legislation to turn New York into a ‘City of Yes.’ We overhauled the way our students learn to read and do math, cut the cost of childcare, and forgave medical debt. We eliminated taxes for low-income families, launched free universal after-school programming, and supported our city’s small businesses with initiatives that cut red tape and expand access to vital funding by hundreds of millions of dollars. We got scaffolding off our buildings, trash bags off our streets, and opened up new public spaces for New Yorkers to enjoy. The haters may have doubted us, but the results are clear. On issue after issue, we brought common-sense leadership to create a safer, more affordable city, and our work has changed our city for the better; it will stand the test of time because we made New York City the best place to live and raise a family.”

“Under Mayor Adams, New York City workers and small businesses have experienced an amazing recovery, with SBS center stage doing the work to revitalize the city’s economy, unlocking everyone’s economic potential,” said SBS Commissioner Dynishal Gross. “From more than 270,000 New Yorkers served through Workforce1, the $60 million NYC BEST has saved for thousands of small business owners, $47 million invested in neighborhoods, and nearly $350 million in financing assistance, our impact has been felt across all five boroughs and on every street corner. I am so proud of the work we have done to make New York City the best place it can be for workers and entrepreneurs alike.”

Key to this economic success have been major expansions in SBS programs and community engagement. Since January 2022 and the start of the Adams Administration, SBS has reached the following milestones:

  • Cutting Red Tape: Through SBS’s Business Express Service Team, or NYC BEST, SBS has served more than 8,500 New York City small businesses, saving them a combined $60 million in fines, fees, and startup costs.

  • Affordable Financing and Capital Access: Since the start of the Adams administration, SBS has facilitated nearly $350 million in financing and funding assistance to New York City’s small business community, including $85 million through the historic NYC Small Business Opportunity Fund and $3 million through the innovative NYC Funds Finder online marketplace.

  • Business Preparedness and Resiliency: SBS has disbursed nearly $420,000 in grants to 90 businesses and conducted 145 free disaster risk assessments through the Business Preparedness and Resiliency Program (BPREP). Grants may be used to purchase flood- and fire-prevention infrastructure.

  • Worker Cooperative Business Development Initiative: Since the start of the Adams administration, SBS has delivered more than 17,500 services citywide, including over 10,800 educational services, such as trainings, workshops, and courses, and nearly 6,700 individualized technical assistance engagements, helping workers and entrepreneurs start, grow, and sustain independently owned businesses.

  • Supporting Minority- and Women-Owned Businesses: The city boasts a record 11,300 certified Minority- and Women-owned Business Enterprises (M/WBEs) which were awarded a combined $2.2 billion in city contracts during Fiscal Year 2025, marking a 55 percent increase since the start of the Adams administration. Since 2022, M/WBEs have received over $23 billion in contracts from mayoral and non-mayoral government agencies

  • Providing Technical Assistance and Specialized Support for M/WBEs: Enrollment in SBS’s “Selling to Government” workshop series increased by 32 percent since the beginning of 2022. Through the course of the administration, 75 percent of M/WBEs awarded city contracts also benefited from SBS services and resources.

  • Investing in Neighborhoods and Commercial Corridors: SBS has invested more than $47 million in neighborhoods and commercial corridors through grants and Business Improvement Districts (BIDs), including more than $3 million in the city’s brand-new Public Realm Grant program, which seeks to enliven public spaces and make New York City more livable.

  • Expanding the Family of BIDs: The Adams administration oversaw the creation of four new BIDs, in Castle Hill, West Village, Cypress Hills, and East Harlem. The city’s network of 77 BIDs now covers 318 miles of storefronts and invested an annual $207 million in New York City’s neighborhoods through 2024 – up from $162 million before Mayor Adams took office.

  • Innovating Outreach: Under Mayor Adams, SBS consolidated its outreach operations into a single SBS Outreach team and modernized outreach efforts through the inclusion of the SBS Mobile Unit, or “Mobie,” as well as a Jobs NYC workforce development sprinter van.

  • Meeting New Yorkers Where They Are: In 2022, SBS Outreach set a goal of doubling the number of events and New Yorkers reached by Fiscal Year 2025 – a goal which was completed one year ahead of schedule; consequently, SBS Outreach has engaged more than 53,000 New Yorkers through 1,125 outreach events and 260 SBS Mobile Unit events in neighborhoods across all five boroughs.

  • Elevating New York City Small Businesses: In 2023, Mayor Adams proclaimed the month of May as New York City Small Business Month, expanding what had initially been a single week into a month-long celebration of all things small business in New York City. Since then, Small Business Month events have been held in all five boroughs each May, culminating in the New York City Small Business Month Expo, which provides business resources, information, one-on-one consultations, and networking opportunities to New York City entrepreneurs under one roof. In its first two years, more than 6,000 small business owners and over 100 partners from the public and private sector participated in the expo.

  • Developing New York City’s World-Class Workforce: Since the start of the Adams administration, SBS provided job placement and training services to more than 270,000 New Yorkers through the city’s 18 NYC Workforce1 Career Centers, resulting in more than 84,000 hires and 28,000 training program enrollments.

  • Jobs NYC: As part of the Adams administration’s efforts to promote economic security and upstream solutions to improve public safety, the city launched the Jobs NYC initiative in early 2024, which brings career resources into ZIP Codes and neighborhoods with the highest levels of chronic unemployment. Through Jobs NYC, SBS has held 55 hiring halls, bringing in over 16,000 attendees participating in more than 5,200 onsite interviews, and leading to just over 2,500 conditional job offers.

  • Global Nightlife Capital: Following changes made under the City of Yes for Economic Opportunity zoning reforms, the repeal of the archaic “Cabaret Laws,” and the transfer of the Office of Nightlife (ONL) to SBS, the Adams administration has driven a renaissance in the city’s nightlife economy. With 16 percent more nightlife establishments in operation today than before the COVID-19 pandemic, New York City’s nightlife scene is stronger than ever.

  • Rebuilding the Nightlife Economy: In 2025, the Adams administration announced the city’s first-ever NYC Nightlife Grants, which provided awards of up to $40,000 to 12 nonprofit organizations that will implement projects to strengthen the resiliency, equity, and vitality of New York City's nightlife industry and commercial corridors.

  • Becoming the Global Leader in Legal Cannabis: Through SBS’s Cannabis NYC initiative, SBS has held over 1,100 educational events for aspiring cannabis entrepreneurs and launched the Cannabis NYC Loan Fund with Tuatara Capital and the New York City Economic Development Corporation. As of 2025, there are 217 licensed cannabis dispensaries across the five boroughs, all of which opened during the Adams administration.

About the NYC Department of Small Business Services (SBS)
SBS helps unlock economic potential and create economic security for all New Yorkers by connecting New Yorkers to good jobs, creating stronger businesses, and building vibrant neighborhoods across the five boroughs. For more information on all SBS services, go to nyc.gov/sbs, call 311, and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.