Notes for Trade Associations
This recognition takes the form of enhanced levels of financial assistance and certain concessions with respect to the usual restrictions prevailing for individual companies.
Eligibility
To be eligible for support, trade associations should:
- Have at least ten eligible member companies
- Have been formally incorporated as a trade association for at least one year
- Be comprised of members which are companies, not individuals
- Represent a specific industry
- Be open to national membership
- Be essentially non profit making
- Be actively furthering the interests of the industry
- Be offering information services to members
What's on offer?
Our professional advisers can offer free advice on how to set about export marketing research. For in-house projects this can cover all stages of a project from desk research in the UK to writing the report following overseas fieldwork. For agency projects, advice can be given on finding and briefing market research agencies and on evaluating proposals and reports. We can also help you determine if appropriate information is already available in a published market research report.
This scheme can also offer significant financial assistance towards marketing research projects, covering:
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In-house terms
we can pay up to 75% of the costs of essential travel, interpreter's fees, daily allowance and administrative costs for one researcher
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Agency terms
we can pay up to 75% of the total project cost
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Desk research terms
- we can pay up to one third of the cost of purchasing a market research report or commissioning a desk research project.
The appropriate level of support will apply to the basic cost of the research; it does not take account of publishing, marketing and distribution costs.
Limitations to support
If a trade association commissions research or carries it out "in-house" on behalf of its members, 75% of the eligible costs may be supported subject to a maximum grant of £60,000 per project. The maximum amount of support available to any trade association in any one year is £100,000.
Trade associations are not subject either to limitations on the number of studies or to any geographical restriction.
Reports commissioned for trade associations should be made available to all members of the association, and, at the discretion of the trade association, may be provided to UK non-member organisations. We require a statement of how many copies have been distributed twelve months after publication of the report.
Confidentiality
Only a very small number of BCC and Government officials will see your proposal. However, six months after completion of the project, one copy of a trade association's marketing research report is made available for the British diplomatic post in the researched country, the relevant market team and the UK Trade & Investment International Sectors Group representative.
A list of trade association reports can be found here.
If confidentiality of the report is critical, the trade association may consider a "Group Application" involving up to six member companies who collectively but exclusively share the research. Further details of this option are available on request.
Guidance notes
To download a copy of our trade association guidance notes, please click here. Contact us for an application form.