The rise in youth markets – “transforming town and city centres with the creativity of young people”

Posted on August 16, 2017 by heathercameron25

Credit: National Market Traders Federation (NMTF)

By Heather Cameron

As we recently reported, despite being around for centuries, and following a decline during the recession, traditional retail markets have experienced something of a revival in recent years, with a new generation of innovative young traders coming to the fore.

Latest figures indicate the sector has a collective turnover of £2.7 billion a year from around 32,000 market traders – a gradual increase of around £200 million year on year since 2013.

The last five years has also witnessed the emergence of youth markets and ‘The Teenage Market’ initiative, which are generating income for young people and teaching them valuable entrepreneurial lessons, as well as transforming town and city centres.

Specialist market boom

But this revival is not wholly in the traditional sense of the market sector. Young people entering the sector tend to trade at festivals, fairs and shows rather than traditional markets, contributing to a specialist market boom.

According to a recent survey of the sector by the National Association of British Market Authorities (NABMA), new trends in the most successful product lines – hot and cold food and drink, baked goods, handmade crafts, fruit and vegetables and mobile phone accessories – have fuelled this growth.

Festivals and shows, which are popular with a younger demographic, are increasing in both size and frequency across the UK. Many of these events also take place out of the traditional season.

Such new trends do not come without their challenges, however, as NABMA’s survey also highlighted. Traders reported escalating pitch fees, poor pitch locations and never-ending paperwork. But despite these drawbacks, traders have reported huge returns at such events, where they can turn over tens of thousands of pounds.

Both NABMA and the National Market Traders Federation (NMTF) agree that the sector needs to embrace these new trends and act to engage this new generation of entrepreneurs.

Youth markets

Indeed, national initiatives in support of youth markets have emerged in recent years to do just that.

This September will see the fifth National Youth Market take place in Manchester, an annual event run by the NMTF in partnership with Manchester Markets. Young people between the age of 16 and 30 from all over the UK trade at this event, showcasing their entrepreneurial talent.

The NMTF also supports traditional market organisers to run specialist markets aimed specifically at young people. Many towns and cities from across the UK have launched their own youth markets, such as those in Manchester and Cambridge, with over 100 such events taking place every year.

Also in its fifth year, is The Teenage Market – “a fast-growing national initiative that’s transforming town and city centres with the creativity of young people”. This initiative provides a free platform for young people to trade at specially organised events. In addition to the retail offer, it also provides a platform for young performers to showcase their talents

Created by two teenage brothers from Stockport to support their town’s large population of young people, The Teenage Market initiative has quickly expanded across the country with thousands of young people taking part in events. Following the success of the first event, it was quickly recognised that the initiative could play an important role in the town’s regeneration strategy; a role which was highlighted by Mary Portas in her 2011 review of high streets.

Revitalising town centres

According to Portas, “Markets are a fantastic way to bring a town to life… I believe markets can serve as fundamental traffic drivers back to our high streets.” And one of her recommendations was to build upon current successful initiatives “to help attract young entrepreneurs to markets and really start building the innovative markets of the future.”

Indeed, the positive benefits for the towns and cities running The Teenage Market events include a rise in footfall, an increase in spend in the local area and a rise in the number of visitors to their local market.

Not only this, but the fusion of retail and live performances has succeeded in attracting a new generation of shoppers and visitors to local markets, helping to breathe new life into town and city centres.

Final thoughts

In an era of online shopping and declining high streets, the fact that local markets led by a new generation of traders are flourishing can only be a good thing.

And with an ageing population of traders, it is arguably now more important than ever to encourage young traders in order to secure the future prosperity of the markets industry.

If you enjoyed this blog post, you may also like our previous post on street markets.

Follow us on Twitter to see what developments in public and social policy are interesting our research team.

‘Olderpreneurs’ – the new generation of start-ups?

Posted on December 14, 2016 by heathercameron25

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By Heather Cameron

Entrepreneurs are often portrayed as bright young things launching start-ups, but does the reality of start-up demographics paint a different picture?

Changing demographics

The UK has certainly witnessed a boom in young entrepreneurship in recent years – the number of under-35s starting businesses in the UK rose by more than 70% between 2006 and 2014.

However, recent research suggests that the boom in young entrepreneurs may be waning. According to research commissioned by Google earlier this year, the majority of young people are “not interested” in starting a business, with four out of five young people surveyed saying they would rather work for a well-established company. Particular concerns were also highlighted over risk and instability.

The UK is, however, still ranked in the top 10 countries with the most favourable conditions for entrepreneurs to start and scale new businesses. And official data suggests that the UK continues to see record numbers of business start-ups, exceeding 600,000 in 2015, up on the previous two years.

So if it isn’t the younger generation heading up this record number, who is it?

‘Olderpreneurs’

Despite media coverage of the entrepreneurial spirit of the younger generation, the average age of an entrepreneur in the UK has actually been estimated at 47.

And according to the latest data from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), the most notable increase in entrepreneurial activity has been amongst the over 50 age group.

Referred to as ‘olderpreneurs’, this group could arguably be the new start-up generation.

There has been a 46.5% increase in freelancers over 50 since 2008, an age group that accounts for 72% of all self-employed people. According to official statistics there are around 1.8 million self-employed people over the age of 50 in the UK.

With an ageing population that is also becoming healthier, perhaps this shouldn’t be such a surprise.

Motivations

Motivations for people starting up their own businesses include redundancy, retirement, family circumstances, growing older and life stage milestones.

As life expectancy increases, many don’t want to give up work at the traditional retirement age, as they still lead active lives. Retirement has been cited as an ‘important tipping point’ for some, with the main motivation not to make money or grow their business, but rather something to keep them occupied or earn some extra money while doing something relatively easy.

The introduction of pension freedoms last year has also led to more over 50s using their pensions to fund new business ventures. The over 55s cashed in more than £4.7billion of their pensions in the first six months after pension freedoms were introduced.

Economic impact

And such activity is good news for the economy. It has been suggested that if the employment rate of 50-64 year olds matched that of the 35-49 age group, the UK economy could be boosted by £88 billion.

Older entrepreneurs have also been shown to be more successful than their younger counterparts. It has been highlighted that businesses run by owner-managers over 50 drive up revenues at their companies three-and-a-half times faster than GDP growth – 11.5% compared with 3.1%.

And older entrepreneurs create jobs at a rate more than seven times faster than the UK economic average.

It has also been suggested by the Prince’s Initiative for Mature Enterprise (PRIME) that start-up failure rates in this age bracket are remarkably low. It recently revealed that 95% of its members were still in business a year or more after starting up, compared to the national average of just 66%.

Final thoughts

A significant percentage of the UK population is past retirement age. And the number of people aged 50 to State Pension age is expected to rise by 3.2 million, while the number aged 16 to 49 will have reduced by 200,000 over the next 10 years.

As a result, keeping this group economically engaged surely has to be a priority.

If you found this article interesting, you may also like to read our previous articles on entrepreneurship and self-employment.

Follow us on Twitter to see what developments in public and social policy are interesting our research team.

Entrepreneurship – the way to drive growth?

Posted on July 20, 2015 by heathercameron25

By Heather Cameron

With endless negative reports on the state of the economy over recent years, the findings of a new study by the Enterprise Research Centre (ERC), The UK growth dashboard 2015, should make for encouraging reading.

Start-ups at record level

The report shows that small businesses have finally made up the ground lost since the recession, with jobs, start-up and growth rates returning to pre-crisis levels in 2014 for the first time since 2008.

Professor Mark Hart, Deputy Director of ERC, said:

“The UK Growth Dashboard provides us with the most detailed picture of where entrepreneurial activity and business growth is occurring around the country.

It shows us that small businesses in every corner of the UK are growing at their fastest rate since the Great Recession, while more and more entrepreneurs have the confidence to take the plunge.”

The UK now has the highest number of start-ups in its history. There were 581,173 new business registrations in 2014, representing an accelerated increase on previous years, and figures from the Office for National Statistics show that the number of firms dropping out of the register has fallen by 6%.

According to the 2015 Global Entrepreneurship Index, the UK is the most entrepreneurial country in Europe and ranks fourth overall.

Regional disparities

Despite such growth however, the dashboard reveals that large regional disparities still remain in entrepreneurship and small business growth across the nations, city-regions and each of the 39 English Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) areas.

In England, a complex picture emerges in terms of LEP geography, which challenges some of the presumptions made about growth hotspots across England.

While London dominates, as expected, there is not a simple north-south divide. Major city regions and more rural LEPs from across the country also have above average rates of start-ups. There are 11 local areas in England with above average rates of start-ups showing early signs of scaling. London tops the list but the local area of Birmingham is close behind, as are the local areas of Newcastle, Leeds, Manchester and Sheffield.

There are also a number of places with above average proportions of fast-growing firms. These include some areas in the South East such as Oxfordshire and Thames Valley. Perhaps surprisingly however Leicester and Leicestershire, Greater Birmingham and Solihull, Northampton and South East Midlands LEP areas as well as Greater Manchester, Liverpool and Leeds City Region LEPs also come under this category – showing that some of the fastest growing businesses in the UK are delivering jobs and revenues as well as wealth for their owners outside London and the South East. Perhaps entrepreneurial activity could therefore help to combat the traditional north-south divide in terms of growth.

Economic impact

Indeed, there is evidence that entrepreneurial activity has a positive impact on economic growth independent of other factors.

A number of benefits recently highlighted include:

enhanced economic growth through introducing innovative technologies, products, and services;
existing firms are challenged to become more competitive due to increased competition from entrepreneurs;
new job opportunities in the short and longer term;
raised productivity of firms and economies;
and accelerated structural change by replacing established, inflexible firms.

It is argued that such benefits will be greater in economies where entrepreneurs can operate flexibly, develop their ideas, and reap the rewards.

Barriers to growth

Regulatory barriers have been cited as a significant impediment to successful entrepreneurship, such as the need to buy permits or licenses. The above report argues that governments need to cut red tape, streamline regulations, and prepare for the adverse effects of job losses in incumbent firms that fail because of the new competition.

Lack of capital, risk to household income and concerns about lack of skills and impact on future career are also significant barriers to enterprise. A recent report from the Social Market Foundation suggests that these barriers are preventing potential ‘high-value entrepreneurship’, which, it argues, has the widest positive impact on the UK economy. While the UK has record levels of entrepreneurship overall, it lags behind other countries on rates of high value entrepreneurship.

The growth dashboard similarly reports that skills and staff, and finance are in the top four main barriers to growth among clients in England. These are a particular barrier in more rural LEPs.

Way forward

It would seem that policy-makers need to help overcome these barriers and encourage the support of entrepreneurs directly rather than impeding their potential with unnecessary regulatory burdens.

The SMF report recommends:

prohibiting non-compete clauses in employment contracts;
championing flexible working;
introducing a ‘right to return’ for people leaving work to start a new business;
and reinstating tax reliefs for corporate venturing.

Perhaps if such barriers can be overcome, we will see record levels of all types of entrepreneurship and thus increased productivity.

The Idox Information Service can give you access to a wealth of further information on entrepreneurship and economic development – to find out more on how to become a member, contact us.

Further reading

Culture, entrepreneurship and uneven development: a spatial analysis, IN Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, Vol 26 No 9-10 Nov-Dec 2014, pp726-752

Business start-ups and youth self-employment in the UK: a policy literature review (2015, University of Brighton)

Policy brief on expanding networks for inclusive entrepreneurship (2015, OECD)

Commercial councils: the rise of entrepreneurialism in local government (2015, Localis)

Self-employment as a route in and out of Britain’s South East, IN Regional Studies, Vol 49 No 4 Apr 2015, pp665-680

Cultural diversity and entrepreneurship in England and Wales, IN Environment and Planning A, Vol 47 No 2 Feb 2015, pp392-411

Activating jobseekers through entrepreneurship: start-up incentives in Europe (2014, European Employment Policy Observatory)

Economic resilience and entrepreneurship: lessons from the Sheffield City Region, IN Entrepreneurship and Regional Development, Vol 26 Nos 3-4, pp257-281

Is entrepreneurship a route out of deprivation?, IN Regional Studies, Vol 48 No 6 Jun 2014, pp1090-1107

*Some resources may only be available to members of the Idox Information Service