Business News Articles

Free branding guide from Design Council
The Design Council has produced a free guide to help small businesses use branding to increase their turnover. Based on research with small businesses and the design industry, the guide includes step-by-step advice, real-life examples and ideas that other small businesses can learn from and put into practice. The guide can be downloaded from the Council's website and covers exactly what bran... more

Demand for London office space falls
New property developments in London have decreased by more than a half in the last year, but the capital is still facing a rise in empty office space. According to a report by property consultancy Drivers Jonas, the number of new developments in the capital has fallen from 46 this time last year to just 17 in the last six months. Despite the slow down in production more than 12m square feet ... more

Franchisor launches new business
An entrepreneur who has already built up one successful franchise operation has launched another venture. Freddie Rayner built Time for You into a one of the country’s leading domestic cleaning franchises over a six-year period and is now inviting other entrepreneurs to buy into his No More Mites business. ... more

Franchise company recognised at national awards
The National Franchise Academy have been recognised at the National Training Awards - the first time that a specialist franchise trainer has won an award at the event. The awards, held on November the 1st, are a government sponsored initiative designed to celebrate the very best in training and development. The National Franchise Academy had to go through four rigorous rounds of assessment b... more

Second independent utility supplier closes
ndependent electricity supplier BizzEnengy, supplier to over 40,000 small and medium sized enterprises has entered administration. Centrina, the owners of British Gas, have bought the company for £3.5 m in cash. Although they claim that customers will be largely unaffected, the closure of another independent supplier is being seen as a blow to small businesses. BizzEnergy was founded in 200... more

Businesses using less electricity
Electricity consumption in the UK has dropped significantly in the last two months, according to figures released by the National Grid. Due to the credit crunch and escalating utility bills demand for electricity in September and October was 3.5% lower than the same two months in 2007. The recent failure of two independent utility firms that supplied SMEs, Electicity4Business and Bizz Energy... more

Record number of employers contact legal advice line
Insurance group Allianz has reported record numbers of calls from employers to their legal hotline to ask for advice on redundancy issues. The helpline, Lawphone, is receiving 70 to 80 calls a day from employers seeking advice on what they can legally do to cut costs in the current economic climate. "Some 60% of calls during the three months to the end of September were about employment issu... more

FSB calls for interest rate cut
The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) is calling for an interest rate cut to help the 1.5m small businesses at risk of closure. In a recent FSB poll of almost 5,000 small business owners over 75% backed interest rate cuts. The poll also revealed that over 50% recorded a decrease in trade in the last two months and nearly 70% of small businesses had either put a freeze on hiring or were co... more

BAA announces Crossrail funding
The operator of Heathrow has agreed to invest £230m in the £16bn Crossrail project, which will link east and west London with the airport. BAA stands to benefit from the new rail link by offering business travellers from the centre of London – including Canary Wharf and the City – a faster route to the airport than is currently possible, making it a more attractive destination for intern... more

Small firms may lose foreign staff
Small businesses face the prospect of huge gaps in their workforces as migrant workers return home, according to research by accounting and business service Tenon. The research showed that the number of SMEs employing workers from abroad has more than doubled in the past two years. In 2006 21% of small companies employed staff who were not from the UK, a figure that has now risen to 48% - me... more