What kind of craft businesses are exporting?
The Policy and Evidence Centre (PEC) explores what distinguishes creative industry exporters. The paper identifies the characteristics that distinguish exporters from non-exporters among Creative Industries Organisations (CIOs) and those that are high-intensity exporters.
The study shows that even very small CIOs export, and exporting need not involve the development of ‘new to the market innovations’. One-person organisations were the least likely to export but even among these 30% were exporters, with 10% found to be high intensity exporters. Beyond the smallest organisations, the propensity to export does not appear to increase progressively with size - the CIOs with the highest propensity to export were those employing 6-10 people. While creative Industry exporters tend to invest in R&D and/or design, the amounts invested are usually modest.
Craft micro-businesses will be interested that -
- Participation in exporting varies widely by the Creative Industry sub-sector. Three-quarters of publishers reported exporting, including 30% as high-intensity exporters. Slightly more than half of both Crafts and ‘Advertising and marketing’ organisations also reported export sales (see table below)
- CIOs selling only to consumers (B2C) were the least likely to export
- Very young CIOs can and do export, and it should not be assumed that exporting is only for well-established CIOs
- Modest investments in R&D and design can aid exporting, but there is no need to develop ‘cutting edge’ innovations to engage in exporting.
Here you can see the proportions of exports by sub-sector, including for craft –