Boost for small businesses as major new support tour launches

Small businesses across the UK are being offered a major new package of support and mentoring, as Small Business Saturday UK launches the UK’s first online roadshow for towns and cities affected by the pandemic.

Launching on 2 November 2020 with daily ‘virtual visits’ to small businesses and communities in over thirty locations across the U.K., Small Business Saturday UK will offer an ambitious, vibrant and intensive programme of locally targeted online advice, workshops and mentoring.

With the aim to support, encourage and uplift small businesses across the country facing the challenge of a second wave of Covid-19 restrictions, the virtual tour will form a central part of the official countdown to Small Business Saturday on 5 December.

Now in its eighth year in the UK, Small Business Saturday celebrates small business success and encourages consumers to ‘shop local’ and support businesses in their communities.

Kicking off in Scotland with a focus on Inverness, the tour will ‘zoom into’ locations across the country each weekday; reaching everywhere from city centres like Edinburgh, Manchester, London and Cardiff, to rural communities such as Pateley Bridge in the Yorkshire Dales and Bodmin in Cornwall.

Due to the pandemic, this year’s online roadshow will temporarily replace the iconic Small Business Saturday UK bus tour which has been running since the campaign began.

The online roadshow will include free virtual mentoring advice on a range of topics, from digital marketing, to time and money management. Live interviews and workshops with local businesses, experts, dignitaries and supporters of the campaign will also be streamed via Small Business Saturday UK’s Facebook page, along with a fun-filled daily ‘Happy Hour’ giveaway broadcast.