London still number one for new business

Posted on 4:14pm Friday 19th Feb 2021

Despite the pandemic’s impact, London is still the number one city in the UK for new business. Entrepreneurs are diversifying their businesses with new, innovative ideas and launching start-ups galore.

However, London’s office blocks remain empty and fewer people are travelling to work each day. Compared to other global cities, London has a much lower proportion of workers returning to offices. Unfortunately, London is also the worst UK city to be while working from home.

London’s workforce is in crisis after steep declines in employees on payroll and new job postings. In October 2020, there were 200,000 fewer employers on payroll compared with the previous year. The furlough scheme has helped a little – the steep shift could have been much worse.

London still number one for new business

It will come as no surprise that more Londoners are selling up and moving out of the capital. In 2020, a staggering 73,950 homes were bought outside of London from people looking to move out of the city. The average leaver spent £372, 860 on their home to move 41 miles outside of London. However, this did vary depending on the type of home leavers were looking for. For example, those looking for a two-bed house would, on average, move 34 miles away compared to 43 miles for a four-bed property.

Sevenoaks, Windsor and Maidenhead saw the largest increase in Londoners while Gravesham and Watford were less popular.

Almost a fifth of UK adults plan to start a business in 2021, especially millennials. Despite working from home standards not being quite on par with other UK cities, London is still the most popular choice to launch a start-up in the UK. It may be expensive and crowded, but London is undoubtedly at the heart of business for the UK.

In 2020, over a quarter of businesses set up were registered in London. That’s 123,462 new businesses just in the capital! Birmingham and Manchester closely followed London.

London shows no sign of slowing down in 2021 either. 28% of Londoners and 26% of Birmingham residents want to start a business in 2021. The two megacities are closely followed by Manchester (21%), Bristol (21%) and Newcastle (17%.) However, Liverpool has the lowest number of residents who are likely to launch a business in 2021. 67% of scousers aren’t interested in entrepreneurship this year.

If you are a budding entrepreneur about to launch your start-up, make sure you have professional business cards, posters and flyers prepared. The business world is a tumultuous environment in the post-pandemic era. Get your name out there, advertise your business and make sure your local community knows what you do.

More and more brands connect with local suppliers and businesses to reduce their carbon footprint and save expenses. You could be one of those suppliers if you network and engage with your local community. Fortunately, if you are already based there, London has a vast local community for you to make use of.

Maybe you're looking for ways to make money from home this year?

Here are 60 tried and tested ways to make money online in the UK and check out my favourite side hustle to make money in my matched betting blog!

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