Social Enterprise Business Planning

Increasing numbers of individuals and groups in the UK are establishing socially motivated enterprises . This trend towards wanting to ‘put back’, create ‘more than profit’ enterprises and do things to support our own local communities is growing fastest amongst young people. In the UK in 2009, levels of male social entrepreneurs rose by 44% with 2.6% of men now likely to be social entrepreneurs. And with 1.7% of women also being social entrepreneurs; the overall levels are increasing rapidly. Social entrepreneurial activity is strongly linked to education levels, with young people and graduates being almost six times more likely to be social entrepreneurs (Source: Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, 2009).

This is encouraging for future growth in this market and, most importantly, gives great hope for a socially responsible future society.

The Blue Horizons team actively supports social enterprise and almost every member of the team has been involved in or actually run enterprises that would today be termed social enterprises. Some team members retain Board and voluntary positions within social enterprise organisations and have particular expertise in developing co-operatives. Hence, our team has empathy and a practical understanding of how to set up, plan and raise finance for this sector.

Blue Horizons regularly works with social enterprise clients to help establish sound business plans, perhaps undertake market research and assist in raising finance. The scale of enterprise and the finance being sought varies greatly and we have experience in targeting finance for projects ranging from a few thousand pounds up to sums in excess of £2.5 million.