As a merchant-specific barometer of small-business sales activity, the Fiserv Small Business Index for October may finally be showing evidence of an upswing. In October, the index showed a 2.3% year-over-year increase among SMBs, the strongest growth since July 2025, Fiserv says.
From September to October, sales were up 0.3%, too, though the index itself, at 146, was flat month-over-month. The index is baselined to 100 and benchmarked to 2019.
This uptick in sales may bode well for SMBs going into the fourth quarter. “Small businesses are entering the holiday season with encouraging momentum on both spending and customer activity,” Prasanna Dhore, Fiserv chief data officer, says in a statement. “October’s monthly sales gains come from more purchases, not larger tickets. Sustaining that momentum as holiday shopping accelerates will be the next signal to watch.”
The index found that average spending per transaction increased 3.5% year-over-year, though foot traffic fell 1.2%, its 12th consecutive year-over-year decline but the mildest since February 2026.
By segment, restaurant sales decreased 0.5% year-over-year. Transactions fell 2.7% from a year prior, an improvement on the September decline of 3.9%. Gas station sales, driven by a 22.3% increase in average tickets, increased 23.2% from a year ago. Retail sales overall were up 1.9% from October 2025 on a 2.2% increase in transactions.
The Small Business Index is drawn from card, cash, and check transactions at the point of sale and online at approximately 2 million U.S. small businesses, according to Milwaukee-based Fiserv. The data includes information drawn from the company’s installed base of Clover POS devices.
