research

New Study: Most 'Small Business' Job Postings Aren't From Small Businesses at All

By Octa Insights, Research Desk, Octabiz

· 6 min read

A magnifying glass inspecting job listing cards above a row of small shops

Most studies about "small business trends" are built on data about small businesses. This one wasn't, and that gap turned out to be the finding.

:::takeaways title="The short version"

  • Only 30.7% of job postings with a disclosed company size (292 of 951) came from businesses with fewer than 500 employees, the federal government's own threshold for "small business."
  • 27.2% came from companies with 10,000 or more employees, and just 10 companies accounted for 16.8% of all 1,000 postings.
  • Two common assumptions didn't hold up: hiring language showed almost no sign of succession planning, and almost none of AI adoption.
  • Most postings didn't disclose a salary, and the applicant counts LinkedIn shows publicly look capped, not exact. :::

:::term word="small business" The U.S. Small Business Administration's default size standard, used across most industries for procurement and lending purposes, is 500 or fewer employees. It's the same threshold this study uses to sort job postings. :::

The headline number

We collected 1,000 live LinkedIn job postings for restaurant, hotel, retail, and home-services management roles across the United States, collected between July 15 and August 14, 2026. Of the 951 postings with a disclosed company size, only 292 (30.7%) came from businesses with fewer than 500 employees, the SBA's own definition of small. 259 postings (27.2%) came from companies with 10,000 or more employees. Ten companies alone accounted for 168 of the 1,000 postings, led by Texas Roadhouse, with 38.

We also tested two specific assumptions directly: that hiring language would show signs of small business owners preparing to retire or sell, and that it would show signs of AI adoption. Neither held up.

:::stats title="What we found across 1,000 postings"

  • 30.7% | of postings with known company size came from businesses under 500 employees
  • 27.2% | came from companies with 10,000 or more employees
  • 16.8% | of all postings came from just 10 companies
  • 14.4% | of postings disclosed a salary figure :::

:::chart type="donut" title="Company size behind 951 postings with a disclosed size" label="Chart" caption="292 postings came from businesses under 500 employees, the SBA's small-business threshold. The remaining 659 came from larger companies, including 259 from companies of 10,000 or more."

  • Under 500 employees | 292 | postings
  • 500 to 9,999 employees | 400 | postings
  • 10,000+ employees | 259 | postings :::

Key findings

  • 292 of 951 postings with known company size (30.7%) came from businesses under 500 employees; 259 (27.2%) came from companies with 10,000+ employees.
  • 10 companies accounted for 168 of 1,000 postings (16.8%); Texas Roadhouse alone posted 38.
  • 144 of 1,000 postings (14.4%) disclosed a salary figure, ranging from 10.8% in restaurant postings to 20.8% in retail postings.
  • 574 of 1,000 postings (57.4%) contained the words "health insurance," "401(k)," or "paid time off."
  • 36 of 1,000 postings (3.6%) contained the word "succession." All 36, read individually, referred to internal leadership development, none referenced a change in business ownership.
  • 9 of 1,000 postings (0.9%) mentioned AI in any form. Of those, 8 were standardized hiring-process disclosures ("we may use AI tools to review applications"), and the ninth used the word in an unrelated context. None described AI use in day-to-day business operations.
  • 912 of 1,000 postings (91.2%) listed an applicant count of exactly 25, across only 53 distinct values in the full sample, a pattern consistent with a display floor on LinkedIn's public job pages rather than a true count.
  • 967 of 1,000 postings (96.7%) were classified as full-time roles.

:::note title="That '25 applicants' number checks out against LinkedIn's own behavior" LinkedIn's public job pages are widely documented to show rounded applicant bands rather than exact counts, including a "25+ applicants" tier and caps like "100+" or "Over 200." That independent pattern lines up with what we found: 912 of 1,000 postings showed exactly 25, and the full sample used only 53 distinct values across 1,000 postings. :::

Independent restaurants are common. Their job postings, in this sample, weren't.

The National Restaurant Association puts independent restaurants at roughly 70% of all U.S. restaurant locations. In our restaurant-manager sample, only 31.6% of postings with a known company size came from businesses under 500 employees. Locations and job postings by employer size aren't the same measurement, and this isn't a direct comparison, but the gap is large enough to be worth noting: however common independent restaurants are on the ground, they made up a minority of the hiring activity visible in this sample.

Company size by category

Category Known size Under 500 employees 10,000+ employees
Restaurant / Food Service 247 of 250 78 (31.6%) 52 (21.1%)
Hotel / Hospitality 242 of 250 122 (50.4%) 23 (9.5%)
Retail 249 of 250 26 (10.4%) 129 (51.8%)
Home Services / Cleaning 213 of 250 66 (31.0%) 55 (25.8%)
All categories 951 of 1,000 292 (30.7%) 259 (27.2%)

:::chart type="bar" title="Share of postings from businesses under 500 employees, by category" label="Chart" caption="Hotel and home-services postings were far more likely to come from a small business than retail postings." source="Octabiz LinkedIn hiring study, 1,000 postings, 2026"

  • Hotel / Hospitality | 50.4% | 122 of 242
  • Home Services / Cleaning | 31.0% | 66 of 213
  • Restaurant / Food Service | 31.6% | 78 of 247
  • Retail | 10.4% | 26 of 249 :::

Company size reflects the LinkedIn company profile linked to the posting, so for franchise and multi-location employers it represents the parent brand rather than the individual location.

How we ran this study

Postings were collected from LinkedIn's public job search results using an automated collection tool, in four searches: "restaurant manager," "hotel manager," "retail store manager," and "cleaning services manager," each limited to U.S. listings posted in the prior 30 days, with 250 postings collected per search. Company size, salary disclosure, benefits language, and keyword mentions of succession and AI were coded from the posting text and associated company profile data.

:::warning title="Known limits" Company size was undisclosed for 49 of 1,000 postings and is excluded from the size-based percentages above. For franchise and multi-location employers, company size reflects the parent brand's LinkedIn profile, not the individual location doing the hiring, so a locally owned franchise can be counted as a large company here. Applicant counts are LinkedIn's own public display figures, not verified totals, and the "25 applicants" pattern is an inference from that display behavior rather than a confirmed platform policy. :::

:::faq

What counts as a small business in this study?

The SBA's own default threshold: 500 or fewer employees, based on the company profile linked to each job posting.

Does this mean small businesses aren't hiring?

Not necessarily. This measures who is posting management roles on LinkedIn specifically. Independent owners may hire through other channels this study didn't capture.

Why do so many postings show exactly 25 applicants?

LinkedIn's public job pages are known to show rounded applicant bands rather than exact counts. Our finding, 912 of 1,000 postings at exactly 25, is consistent with that behavior rather than a coincidence. :::

References

Full findings report and the complete 1,000-row dataset are available on request at insights@octabiz.ai.