Are you a budding entrepreneur with ambitions of setting up your own business? Then this course is ideal for you. It’s been designed for you to take those first steps in creating a business start-up, including the marketing, legal and financial requirements, plus you’ll gain an understanding of how to write a viable business plan.

Here in the North East there’s an ambition to grow the number of start-ups to support our local economy, let us help you become one of them.

All business start-ups need to focus on four key areas to ensure their business is a success and you’ll study each of these in detail:

Initial business start-up ideas
You’ll work on the pros and cons of two different business ideas and then choose one to take forward, considering the type of ownership and the skills and resources you will need to set up your business.

Marketing
How you communicate with your customers and how they view your brand is vital to its success. In this unit you’ll learn the importance of identifying your potential target market and market research. Plus, you’ll get creative developing a brand name, logo and promotional material for your business.

Legal and financial considerations  
Understanding all things numbers and legal are vitally important to a business start-up and you’ll learn about HMRC and tax requirements including VAT, cash flow forecasts, invoices and payment receipts.  You’ll also explore other legislation that may impact on your business such as employment, health and safety, data protection and digital and copyright.

Developing a business plan 
If you’ve ever watched The Apprentice, you’ll understand the importance of a water-tight business plan and how every detail of it needs to be considered.  In this unit, you’ll learn how to develop a robust and thorough business plan that not even Sir Alan Sugar could reject.

As part of your overall study programme, you will also be required to attend Maths and/or English if you have not achieved a grade 4 or above in these subjects.

If you are interested in playing a sport, you will also be given the opportunity to attend training sessions at our Academy for Sport and participate in match games.