In business, numbers usually tell the story. If you use them to judge 2010, it was probably a better year for small businesses than 2009. In the first quarter of 2010, for example  the most recent period for which the data are available  there was a net loss of 96,000 companies with fewer than 100 employees, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In 2009, the loss was 400,000 companies.

Numbers, however, do not tell the whole story. Behind every one of those small businesses that failed was an entrepreneur with an idea and a dream. “It was very painful,” said one of those owners, Elizabeth Kavanaugh, whose 12-year-old business, Large Format Digital, closed in March. “My husband and I are still struggling with the aftermath.”

Marc Hedlund, co-founder of Wesabe, a now-defunct personal finance site, wrote on his blog that while he was “enormously sad” about the closing of his business, he hoped that by writing about the difficulties Wesabe faced he would “inform other people who try to start companies in the future.” In that spirit, here are the stories of six small businesses that closed their doors in 2010.

Wesabe

A personal finance Web site based in San Francisco. Wesabe opened in 2006 and closed in July.

AT ITS PEAK Wesabe was one of the first movers in the Web 2.0 financial space. Its founders, Mr. Hedlund and Jason Knight, envisioned a site that would help consumers budget their money and make better spending decisions. The company received two rounds of venture capital financing totaling $4.7 million and signed up 150,000 members in its first year.