Covid-19 Grant Support
Scottish Wedding Industry Fund
This fund is now closed.
The Scottish Wedding Industry Fund aimed to help as many businesses as possible operating in the Scottish wedding industry – and their supply chain - to survive the current Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and then restart once restrictions ease, thus protecting jobs.
Fund details
The Fund was open from 28 January to 25 February 2021 to eligible businesses whose main income comes from the wedding sector, offering grants of between £5,000 and £25,000 depending on turnover. It was managed by a partnership of South of Scotland Enterprise, Scottish Enterprise and Highlands and Islands Enterprise on behalf of the Scottish Government.
At SOSE, we administered £1.7m worth of funding to 170 eligible businesses. Full details are available below.
Those applying were required to provide supporting information including evidence of annual turnover such as accounts, a bank statement from last three months and confirmation the business was trading as at December 2019 before COVID-19 struck.
Each application was fully assessed and each applicant was contacted by the relevant enterprise agency to inform them of their decision. Payments for successful applications have now all been processed.
PERF and Creative, Tourism and Hospitality Enterprises Hardship Fund
These funds are now closed.
In April 2020, the Scottish Government made available additional grant funding for vulnerable Scottish SMEs which are vital to local, regional and national economies and for tourism, hospitality and creative industry businesses experiencing hardship as a result of COVID-19.
Fund details
Scotland’s enterprise agencies worked at pace with VisitScotland and Creative Scotland to design and deliver this funding via two short-term funds:
- A £30 million national Creative, Tourism & Hospitality Enterprises Hardship Fund for small creative, tourism and hospitality companies not in receipt of other COVID-19 business grants. The fund was designed to support companies in tourism, creative industries and hospitality experiencing immediate hardship, due to ineligibility for other COVID-19 Government grant support. The focus was to help companies who could demonstrate a negative cashflow position over three months and those furloughing staff were eligible to apply.
- A £120 million national Pivotal Enterprise Resilience Fund (PERF) for viable but vulnerable SME firms which are vital to Scotland’s economy. The fund was designed to support companies with working capital to help them continue trading or to come out of hibernation and the focus was on firms that are vital to local, regional or national economic prosperity and those who could help to kick start the recovery.
At SOSE, we administered over £12m of this funding to almost 300 businesses across Dumfries and Galloway and the Borders. Full details are available below.
What was the application process for the PERF and Creative, Tourism and Hospitality Hardship funds?
Each application was rigorously appraised by a team of trained assessors and through the use of an automated system, against criteria set nationally in terms of number of employees, wage levels, impact on supply chains, local communities, and supply to critical sectors, such as the NHS.
Every successful application passed eligibility checks and was able to demonstrate a clear need for emergency funding as well as its vitalness to the economy.
How did you decide who to provide this funding to?
Our decisions were based on the agreed criteria of the funds, how pivotal businesses are to our economy, how vulnerable businesses are due to the impact of COVID-19 and how viable moving forward into recovery.
We attempted to make contact with every unsuccessful applicant to fully explain the decision, and discuss any other potential support we could facilitate.
View the South of Scotland businesses in receipt of Covid-19 Grant Support
Creative, Tourism & Hospitality Enterprises Hardship Fund recipients