Support for businesses

Help to set up a business in Barnsley

Enterprising Barnsley is our economic development arm. They support existing business owners wanting to expand, as well as new start-up ventures. They also offer a wide range of free support to private sector investors moving to Barnsley. 

They can help with:

  • support to find commercial sites and premises
  • support to access financial assistance
  • recruitment advice
  • guidance on employee training
  • access to free business coaching, networking and speaker-led events

Support for town centre businesses

If you run a business in Barnsley town centre, we can help you developing and promoting it. You might also find it useful to read our guide for businesses.

Keeping informed and getting involved

Town centre newsletter

We send a business-to-business newsletter by email with news and events from around the town centre. This includes activities you may want to get involved in. We send the newsletter is issued every two months.

To sign up to receive the newsletter or ask to include content, please fill in our online form.

Town centre retail and hospitality forum

The forum meets four times a year. All town centre businesses welcome. Please fill in our online form if you'd like to attend. The forum also has a Facebook group.

Promoting your business

Our Barnsley town centre Facebook page promotes the town centre to shoppers and visitors. As well as liking and sharing the page with friends, family and customers, we can publish content on your behalf.

If you have any information you'd like including, please fill in our online form.

Barnsley Gift Card

The Barnsley Gift Card is a pre-paid Mastercard. It provides a simple way for local people to buy a gift card for friends and family. Owners of the card can spend them at a range of local businesses. This includes restaurants, cafes, shops, salons and more.

Benefits for your business

  • It’s free. It doesn’t cost a business anything to be part of the programme. There are no extra set-up or on-going fees for businesses.
  • It introduces new customers. People that receive the gift card tend to explore more. 15% of the redemptions are with customers visiting a business for the very first time.
  • It brings extra spend. Customers that redeem cards spend on average 40% more than the value of the gift card. They tend to upgrade their experience, going for higher margin products.
  • It’s easy to implement. As the programme users the Mastercard system, it’s easy for a business to get involved. No changes are needed to software or hardware in order to accept the gift card.
  • It pays automatically. You'll receive the full value of the money received via your existing payment terminals.

Benefits for the customer

  • It offers choice. People like the fact that the cards can be used on a huge range of products and services. They offer more choice than other gift cards or vouchers.
  • There’s so much flexibility. You don’t have to use the full value of the card in one business. It means that people can enjoy spending at multiple businesses, over a period of 12 months.
  • It supports the local economy. When you buy a Barnsley Gift Card for someone you know the money is going stay local.
  • It works for everyone. We all have people that are difficult to buy presents for. The Barnsley Gift Card gives the choice back to the recipient, making sure they get something they really want.
  • It’s secure. The Barnsley Gift Card is secured by Mastercard.

How to get set up

There's a three step set up process:

  1. Complete the Barnsley Gift Card registration form.
  2. Sign the merchant participation form.
  3. Process a declined transaction through the card terminal. This can be done in two ways:
    • We can visit your business and process a registration transaction using a blank gift card.
    • We can register your business remotely by processing a 'card holder not present' transaction. This is done using the card details stated on the registration form.

For more details, please fill in our online form.

Land and property enquiries

If you're interested in renting or buying business space from us, please see our available land and property.