Member Article

Summer period hot for sales say UK SMEs

In the first-ever biannual Ferratum SME Future Climate Indicator, it is revealed that 35% of UK small and medium businesses view the summer period as the most important part of the year when it comes to sales. Despite the general uncertainty caused by Brexit, UK respondents were confident investing more in their business.

The Ferratum SME Future Climate Indicator shows a continued trend of traditional banks giving way to other, more flexible funding solutions. As many as three out of four (72%) UK-based SMEs said that they would comfortably seek external funding to help grow their business based on a promising economic outlook in the UK. The results reveal that, on average, new finance solutions have topped traditional banks by three per cent, indicating a growing demand for more flexible funding solutions.

The Netherlands is the frontrunner when it comes to businesses favouring new financing options with 42% of businesses preferring alternative financing over financing from traditional banks. Although responses differed significantly between the markets, one thing they all shared was a demand for new, flexible funding solutions to support their ambitions to expand.

Of all businesses surveyed, over a third said they would seek external funding in the next six months, while 41% said they were unsure. The economy is booming in the UK with three-quarters of the businesses saying they planned to apply for external funding. Over half of Danish businesses said they were uncertain whether they would need external funding. Additionally, 41% of UK SME´s said they planned to invest more in the business than the previous year, followed closely by the Netherlands (35%) and Denmark (25%). However, almost a third of Swedish businesses, said they intended to invest less this summer than last year.

“We have seen positive signs in the market for some time and by conducting our own study we’re able to back up our own analysis of UK entrepreneurs who are the backbone of our economy at the moment. It seems that in the UK, the summer is a critical time for SMEs, with much time given to development and growth of their business. It’s great to see that UK SME owners are feeling optimistic about the future, with such a high percentage planning on investing more in the next year.” – Tony Gundersen, UK Country Manager.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ferratum .