New business report reveals British Library and Arts Council England programme delivers £16.84 for every £1 of public money spent
A new report reveals Get Ready for Business Growth, an innovative business growth programme aimed at the creative industries and funded by Arts Council England and the British Library, delivers a benefit cost ratio of £16.84 for every £1 of public money spent.
Between September 2022 and 2024, Get Ready for Business Growth helped over 400 individuals in the creative industries and cultural sector across the country to grow their ventures. The programme:
- Contributed to £2.4m in revenue growth and £3.9m of safeguarded sales
- Established 223 new jobs and safeguarded 179 jobs
- Increased turnover by an average of £33,700
- Introduced 298 new products, processes and services in 98 participant businesses
- Supported 353 individuals from under-represented groups, including ethnic minorities, women, disabled people and people identifying as working class or LGBTQIA+
Get Ready for Business Growth is an online, nationwide offer with impact across the country, from Glasgow and Tees Valley to Sussex and Devon, through the British Library’s Business & IP Centre National Network. Every quarter, 25+ creative founders are offered support and guidance to boost their growth and build their business skills, capacity and resilience through the programme's scale-up scheme. The programme also offers mentoring and start-up streams for smaller creative businesses.
Arts Minister, Sir Chris Bryant said: ‘Public libraries are an important part of our local communities and offer a space for entrepreneurs to explore their business ideas and find guidance to help them flourish and succeed.’
‘The British Library's BIPC network is a real benefit to businesses and it is great to see the value of the network demonstrated again through this evaluation.’
Isabel Oswell, Director of Business Audiences at the British Library, said: ‘Helping businesses to innovate and grow is one of the British Library's core purposes and this report reiterates the unique contribution of the Business & IP Centre National Network to support business founders from all backgrounds in the creative industries and cultural sector to scale and expand.’
‘With the results Get Ready for Business Growth has achieved in just two years, the level of reach and impact with further public and private sector support could be extraordinary. There are around 4,000 public libraries in the UK, many within a 30-minute walk of most of the population, and they are ideal organisations to provide business support and kickstart economic growth at a targeted, local level.’
Luke Burton, Director, Libraries at Arts Council England, said: ‘It's great to see the success of the Get Ready for Business Growth initiative spelled out and clear to see in this latest report. This fantastic project has delivered exceptionally against our and the British Library's investment and helped support the expansion of creative and cultural ventures across the country.’
Get Ready for Business Growth graduate, Jacqueline Harvey, founder of Women in Art Fair, an annual event dedicated to redressing the gender imbalance in the art industry, said: ‘It is hard to get independent advice even if you pay for it; that's what I like about the support provided by the British Library, it is very professional and extremely independent.’
Carol Wallace and Vicky Hutchinson, founders of CreativeHutch, a branding, marketing and design agency in Carlisle, were introduced to Get Ready for Business Growth through the Cumbria Business & IP Centre. They said: ‘We wouldn't have scaled so quickly without the confidence and advice from the programme. It's given us the tools to grow effectively, and we've already hit this year's turnover target in Q3.’
Business & IP Centres (BIPCs) are physical hubs where people can learn, network and access free and low-cost information and support in protecting and commercialising a business idea. The first BIPC opened at the British Library in 2006 and the BIPC National Network was established in 2012, with support from the Intellectual Property Office. Following a £13 million investment from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in 2020, the BIPC National Network expanded to over 100 locations, reaching people who are under-represented in business in more urban, rural and coastal locations than ever before.
Notes to editors
The data presented in Get Ready for Business Growth: Igniting creativity across the nation is based on the combination of three beneficiary surveys conducted by The Insight Works Ltd in September 2024. It comprises 95 responses to the Scale-up programme, 49 responses to the Mentoring programme, 28 responses to the Start-up exit survey and 13 responses to the Peer-to-Peer exit survey. Where applicable, project baseline and impact data has been used to inform the conclusions based on the combination of three beneficiary surveys conducted by The Insight Works Ltd.
Please contact press@bl.uk for further information, images or interview requests.
About the British Library
We are the national library of the UK and we are here for everyone. Our shelves hold over 170 million items – a living collection that gets bigger every day. Although our roots extend back centuries, we aim to collect everything published in the UK today, tomorrow and far into the future. Our trusted experts care for this collection and open it up for everyone to spark new discoveries, ideas and to help people do incredible things.
We have millions of books, and much more besides. Our London and Yorkshire sites hold collections ranging from newspapers and maps to sound recordings, patents, academic journals, as well as a copy of every UK domain website and blog. Our public spaces provide a place to research, to meet friends, to start up a new business or simply to get inspired by visiting our galleries and events. We work with partners and libraries across the UK and the world to make sure that as many people as possible have the chance to use and explore our collections, events and expertise. And we're always open online, along with more and more of our digitised collection.
About Arts Council England
Arts Council England is the national development agency for creativity and culture. Our vision, set out in our strategy Let's Create, is that by 2030, we want England to be a country in which the creativity of each of us is valued and given the chance to flourish, and where every one of us has access to a remarkable range of high-quality cultural experiences. Between 2023 and 2026 we will have invested over £467 million of public money from Government, alongside an estimated £250 million each year from The National Lottery, to help ensure that people in every part of the country have access to culture and creativity in the places where they live. Until Autumn 2025, the National Lottery is celebrating its 30th anniversary of supporting good causes in the United Kingdom: since the first draw was held in 1994, it has raised £49 billion and awarded more than 690,000 individual grants.
Visit our website to learn more about our work.