Expanding a Small Business

Like many others I run what I believe is a successful company.

And as I started it myself with no cash behind me, and have never sought external investors, it is inevitably funded on credit and debt. Again like most other UK small and medium sized companies.

Our balance sheet is obviously positive, so as long as our clients pay us we can pay all our suppliers, all our salaries, all our bank borrowing, and still have some left over.

But my BIG QUESTION is what do we all do if the banks wont fund us?

My late Saturday night after a beer thinking aloud is we could all enter into an exchanging goods and services for some form of equity investment, all becoming investment banks without exchanging cash.

We all then have a vested interest in each others success?

Let me know if you think it is a good idea or yet another thinking aloud silly idea to keep the UK economy lubricated!

Yes there is a Credit Crunch.

Yes there is financial turmoil.

Yes the UK economy is almost certainly in recession.

And yes the worst is yet to come!

However, I am both amazed and pleased to announce that at ASK we have had record UK sales in the last 3 months.

Our UK sales were up 15% on the same period last year.

We have advertised less, and a large proportion of our trade comes from the financial sector, so I am not saying it makes sense! The world certainly seems to have been turned upside down.

Complacent I am not, concerned I certainly am, but I truely believe all proactive strong UK companies will get through all this.

What we all have to do is not entrench, not stop investing, not stop speculating, and then together, with or without the help of financial institutions ensure the UK economy remains as strong as possible.

We have all over the last 10 years invested in strong infrastructure and systems, and as they all remain in place UK companies like us are better placed than many around the world to ride out a recession or even a depression, and come back even stronger.

ASK will be continuing to think glass half full, and are NOT cutting back our investment plans over the next 6 months, I hope everyone else will do the same!