10 Facts About UK Businesses Which May Surprise You

SME’s are the lifeline to the British economy, with more than 99% of business having fewer than 250 employees. Here are some little-known facts about British businesses.

In 2015, there were 5.4 million private sector businesses in the UK, up by 146,000 or 3% since 2014.

This number represents the growth of the British economy and how many people are turning to entrepreneurship to earn their income.

There is a rise in entrepreneurship in the 20-29 age gap

This means that a lot more young people are starting their own business between the ages of 20 and 29 compared to any other age group.

In 2015, there were 1.9 million more businesses than in 2000, an increase of 55% over the whole period.

Even since the recession back in 2007, business has still grown since 2000 – even taking into the account the large amounts of business deaths in 2007-2009.

In the UK in 2015 there were 1,028 businesses per 10,000 resident adults.

That means, on average – approximately 1 in 10 people run their own business. Figures do vary across the UK with London having 1,434 businesses per 10,000 residents and the North East only having 629 businesses per 10,000 residents.

A third of UK businesses are in London or the South East (976,000 in London and 878,000 in the South East).

This shows that Kent and London are some of the best places to start a business. Canterbury becoming a digital hub full of startups and hundreds more people selling artisanal products since the rise of local markets. As Kent and London have great travel links to France/Europe and also transatlantic flights and shipping – it’s no surprise that business is booming around here!

In 2014, 20% of SMEs in the UK were majority led by women. This is two percentage points higher than in 2012 and equates to around 1.1 million SMEs.

There are more and more businesses that are now women led, even the FTSE100 board has 26% female representation across the board. Great news for gender equality!

Small businesses accounted for 99.3% of all private sector businesses at the start of 2015 and 99.9% were small or medium-sized (SMEs).

This means that only 0.1% of business are known as large businesses (over 250 employees). It’s strange when you think of high street chains and the like!

The UK is ranked number 6 of 189 in the world for ease of doing business by the World Economic Forum and World Bank.

This shows that the UK economy is booming. There are thousands of businesses that are deciding to relocate to the UK, and

The internet represents a £19 billion business opportunity for small firms in the UK.

Which is even more reason to start your business online!

More people start businesses because they want to, not because they need to

This is the same across the board (see above graph). You can see that the desire for entrepreneurship far outdoes the necessity due to unemployment.!