{"id":595542,"date":"2026-04-09T11:30:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T11:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/595542\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T11:30:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T11:30:13","slug":"thanet-tunbridge-wells-and-dartford-top-the-entrepreneurial-list-in-kent-as-start-up-loans-hit-25m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/595542\/","title":{"rendered":"Thanet, Tunbridge Wells and Dartford top the entrepreneurial list in Kent as Start Up Loans hit \u00a325m"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The three most entrepreneurial places in Kent have been revealed.<\/p>\n

It comes after the British Business Bank revealed it had delivered \u00a325 million of Start Up Loans to the county\u2019s small business owners.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe county\u2019s most entrepreneurial areas, according to the number of Start Up Loans issued, have been revealed<\/p>\n

Thanet<\/a> is the most entrepreneurial local authority in the county, with the highest number of the loans – designed to grow fledgling firms – taken out, and is the most entrepreneurial Kent local authority when adjusted for population size.<\/p>\n

On the same measure, Tunbridge Wells and Dartford come second and third respectively.<\/p>\n

The local authorities receiving the highest volume of loans in total are Thanet, Maidstone and Canterbury.<\/p>\n

Thanet has received more than \u00a32.6m through 300 loans, Maidstone \u00a32.55m via 256 loans and Canterbury just over \u00a32.3m through 225 loans.<\/p>\n

The Start Up Loans programme has now supported some 2,500 cash injections – worth around just over \u00a310,000 each – since it was launched in 2012.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Sea Scrub Sauna’s latest outlet in Folkestone<\/p>\n

The programme is designed to provide accessible finance to all, including those who may otherwise struggle to secure finance from traditional high-street lenders.<\/p>\n

Just over a tenth of loans (11%) have been provided to founders under the age of 25. Of those loans, more than one in five (22%) were taken out by NEETS (Not in Education, Employment, or Training) in the county.<\/p>\n

Robin Bartlett, the founder of Sea Scrub Sauna<\/a>, is one of those who have benefited from the money.<\/p>\n

Since launching in 2023, he has now opened three sites across Kent – the most recent of which, in Folkestone, started trading last month<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He explained: \u201cAs a start-up, we didn\u2019t have an established credit history and interest rates were heavily fluctuating at the time of setting up, so the fact Start Up Loans backed my business when other providers may not have, was a real vote of confidence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"RobinRobin Bartlett, founder of Sea Scrub Sauna<\/p>\n

Blair McDougall, Minister for Small Business, said: \u201cKent is home to some of the brightest and most innovative entrepreneurs in the UK and through Start Up Loans, we are ensuring they have access to the finance they need to reach their full potential.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an impressive milestone for the programme, which has supported thousands of entrepreneurs across Kent, boosting businesses, job opportunities and the economy.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the wider South East region, more than \u00a3150m worth of funding has been provided to small business owners.<\/p>\n

Kent now stands as the most entrepreneurial county in the region with the highest volume and value of loans – over one in six loans in the South East region were taken out by Kent founders.<\/p>\n

Louise McCoy, managing director of Start Up Loans Products at the British Business Bank, added: \u201cReaching this milestone in Kent shows the impact Start Up Loans is having in supporting start-up and early-stage businesses in the county, as well as the wider region.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The three most entrepreneurial places in Kent have been revealed. It comes after the British Business Bank revealed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595543,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[64,63,99,198,15972,290714],"class_list":{"0":"post-595542","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entrepreneurship","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-entrepreneurship","12":"tag-kent","13":"tag-thanet"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595542\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}