Category
Market Research
10 posts on market research.
8 AUG 2026 · 7 MIN
How many UK businesses open and close each year
About 317,000 UK businesses opened in 2024. About 280,000 closed. That is roughly one opening every 100 seconds, and one closing not far behind it. Here is what those two numbers are made of, and what they tell you about the market you sell into.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 7 MIN
The fastest growing UK industries, and how to tell real growth from noise
Business admin and support services added new firms faster than any other UK trade in the most recent quarter, at 12.3% growth. But a fast quarter and a growing market are not the same thing. Here is how to tell them apart.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
UK business survival rates: how many new firms are still trading five years on
Of the UK businesses that opened in 2019, 38.4% were still trading five years later. Survival is not evenly spread: it swings by more than ten points between regions and further between trades. Here is what the ONS figures show.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
Where new UK businesses are being created, region by region
London opens more businesses per head than anywhere else in the UK, at 12.7% a year. But it also closes them faster than Northern Ireland, and the region where new firms last longest is neither. Here is the regional picture.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 7 MIN
How to read ONS business data without getting it wrong
There are two official counts of UK businesses and they disagree by nearly three million. Neither is wrong. Here is what each one counts, which to quote, and the four mistakes that turn free public data into a bad decision.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
The UK birth rate is falling. Which businesses should care?
There were 585,396 live births in England and Wales in 2025, down 1.6% in a year, with the fertility rate at 1.39 children per woman. That number moves slowly and it moves whole industries with it. Here is which ones, and when.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
The UK is getting older, and the care market is growing with it
The number of people aged 85 and over is projected to rise from 1.7 million to about 3.1 million by the mid-2040s. That is the most predictable demand curve in the UK economy, and a lot of businesses sit downstream of it.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
The 14,330 UK companies that are actually scaling
Only 4.9% of UK businesses with staff grow fast enough to count as high growth. There were 14,330 of them in 2024. If you sell anything priced for a company with headcount, these are the accounts worth knowing about.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
How many small businesses are there in the UK?
There were 5.7 million private sector businesses in the UK at the start of 2025. Three quarters of them employ nobody but the owner. That single fact should change who you aim at and what you charge.
Read →8 AUG 2026 · 6 MIN
Where UK companies are closing fastest, and what it tells you
76,840 UK businesses closed in a single quarter, and closures rose in 11 of the 16 main trades. Closures are treated as bad news and largely ignored. They are the most useful number on the sheet if you sell to businesses.
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