Back Her Business, programme to boost female entrepreneurship in Northern Ireland, has been officially renewed for 2020, following an announcement by Ulster Bank.
‘Back Her Business’ is Northern Ireland’s first female-only crowdfunding programme developed in partnership with established provider, Crowdfunder, and forms part of Ulster Bank’s wider ambition to reduce the gender gap when it comes to entrepreneurship.
On a visit to Belfast today, Les Matheson, CEO of Personal Banking with RBS, made the announcement that the scheme is to be renewed following a successful first year. During the visit, Mr. Matheson took the opportunity to meet some of the female entrepreneurs who had already received funding as part of the first Back Her Business cohort and discuss with them the many ways to tackle real and perceived barriers to female entrepreneurship.
Women are able to join the programme and launch their business idea for crowdfunding. The crowdfunding programme forms parts of Ulster Bank, NatWest and Royal Bank of Scotland’s wider commitment to help, inspire and support a further 400,000 female-led businesses by 2025.
Crowdfunder will provide the infrastructure and access to its wider network of partners and entrepreneurs, with the bank acting as a connector and enabler. Though most of the funding will come from ‘the crowd’, the bank will provide a top-up in funding of £1m per annum and will be offering up to 50% of an individual’s fundraising target (capped at £5,000) for certain successful projects1. The initiative will not be equity crowdfunding, it will be donation and reward based – i.e. funders will be given a discount towards products or services in return for their donation in some instances.
In 2019, The Rose Review unearthed the fact that only 5.6% of women run their own business and further bank data also shows that women are half as likely as men to start a business.
After the meeting, Les Matheson, CEO, Personal Banking, RBS said ‘Back her Business’ is designed to give women the confidence to take the leap, and grow their own entrepreneurial ventures.
“Backing female entrepreneurs helps everyone. It helps our economy, the entrepreneurial eco-system of cities and the eventually, the wider consumer. For too long women have been out off from starting a business so we want to make this a thing of the past and support them on their business journey.
“I’ve been encouraged by meeting such a vibrant group of female entrepreneurs in Belfast this morning and am confident that this programme can help many more women-led businesses going forward.”
Mary-Louise Fellowes, Co-Founder of the e-commerce sustainable marketplace LOOLYN, which sells eco-friendly, plastic free items from a base in Holywood Co. Down, said Back her Business had helped her business to gain profile.
“Being part of Back her Business gave us access to crucial funding which is so vital in those early days when we were trying to get LOOLYN off the ground. We’d had the idea of a marketplace for more sustainable products for quite some time but were struggling to know where to go to validate our idea and gain feedback from both investors and people who would use our business.
“Finance aside, we found being part of the programme and meeting other successful female entrepreneurs to be extremely beneficial, too. It’s true that you cannot be what you cannot see so being surrounded by like-minded, inspirational women, really spurred myself and my business partner on and helped us bring our idea into fruition.”
For more information about Back her Business or to find out how to apply, visit www.ulsterbankbackherbusiness.co.uk
