By Mary Gahan BBC News Online business reporter

"I've always wanted to have my own business and never had the courage to do it," says Clive Brown.

He is sitting in a tiny room lined with shelves, with just enough room for a desk and two chairs, in the corner of a shop.

Hythe's High Street is one of the longest in the country

His shop.

A few weeks ago he was a stationery supplier. Now he is the boss of one of the artists' materials and stationery stores he used to supply.

"I saw businesses all over the South East, I saw good ones and bad ones.

I didn't particularly want to be in a shop but it was a challenge to open a business Keren Belcourt

"When the opportunity for this came up I thought, 'Yes, I can do it and put my own stamp on things'."

After 25 years of working for other people, Mr Brown is finally his own boss.

"This is week six, it's everything I wanted and more, even though I'm in the shop six days a week at the moment," he says.

He is calling his shop Art-Write, but for now the old name, Tyler's, is still above the shop window and door.

Thriving and surviving

The business is in Hythe, a small town just along the coast from Folkestone, in Kent.

Its narrow High Street, one of the longest in the country, is full of small shops and there are only a handful of national chains.

"Hythe is a thriving town at the moment with a lot of independent, specialist traders and its charm and uniqueness is a result of that," says Nick Meurice, chairman of the chamber of commerce.

That does not mean that small shops are guaranteed to survive, but for every business that fails here, there seems to be another ready to take its place.

Look long-term; do you want to do this all of your life; do you see yourself sitting in a shop for eight hours a day including Saturday? Nick Meurice

A specialist shoe shop has just opened where a gift shop went out of business.

A butcher's has just closed down, but a music shop, candle retailer and another gift store have all recently opened.

Across the country there are more than half a million small businesses in wholesale, retail and repairs, according to figures from the Department of Trade and Industry.

And many shopkeepers have been running their firms for years.

"There's a degree of inertia, even with small business," says Mr Meurice.

"Because you are in it and you have got the stock, you have got the premises and you have got a reputation which is sufficient, you keep going."

Keren Belcourt had no intention of joining her father's electrical retail business, Whitnall's.

But when he decided to open a second shop in Hythe, seven years ago, she agreed to run it.

"I didn't particularly want to be in a shop but it was a challenge to open a business and now I do all the buying."

One of her sons already works with her and she hopes the family firm will carry on.

Dreams and nightmares

At the other end of the street is Nick and Alison Meurice's jewellers.

They found that to make the shop successful they had to be prepared to change.

"We started as specialists in antique jewellery but we found that was not in such high demand as we anticipated and it was very difficult to replace the stock, so we started doing more modern jewellery," says Mr Meurice.

"Silver jewellery is not what we wanted to do.

Selling what the customers want

"But we looked at what others were selling and others were buying, what young people were wearing, and changed."

He warns that people need to think carefully before they open a shop.

"Choose your town carefully. Choose what you are going to do carefully and not just because you are interested in it.

"You've got to work through what it's going to cost and what you're going to make out of it.

"Look long-term. Do you want to do this all of your life? Do you see yourself sitting in a shop for eight hours a day including Saturday?

"Don't look through rose-tinted spectacles."

Clive Brown, in his art and stationers shop up the road, is satisfied that he has considered all the pitfalls.