Birmingham is a city located in the West Midlands of England. It is the second-largest city, second-largest metropolitan area, and third-largest urban area in the United Kingdom, with roughly 1.2 million inhabitants within the city area. It has 2.8 million inhabitants within the urban area, and 4.3 million inhabitants within the metropolitan area. The city proper is the most populated English local government district.
Birmingham grew to prominence as a center of manufacturing and engineering but the economy of Birmingham is dominated by the service sector, which accounted for 88% of the city’s employment in 2012. Birmingham is a great place to start and run a business because, for five years running, Birmingham has produced the highest number of new businesses outside of London.
Affordable office space, new developments, and a talent base not as thinly stretched as the capital mean that Birmingham is ideal for new businesses looking to set up and run successfully. If you are looking towards starting a business in Birmingham and you have not made up your mind on the choice of business to start, here are the 50 best business opportunities to consider.
What Business Opportunities Exist in Birmingham?
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Open a Tattoo Parlor
A tattoo parlor is one of the good business opportunities that are thriving in Birmingham. A tattoo artist is an individual who applies permanent decorative tattoos, often in an established business called a “tattoo shop”, “tattoo studio” or “tattoo parlor”. Tattoo artists usually learn their craft via an apprenticeship under a trained and experienced mentor.
Tattoo parlors offer services such as designing customized tattoos, providing body piercings, predesigning tattoos, maintaining aftercare tattoo services, administering permanent makeup tattoos, laser tattoo-removal services et al.
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Open a Body Piercing Studio
Another business opportunity that is thriving in Birmingham is a body piercing studio. Body piercing studios are known to provide body piercing services, which involve puncturing the skin in order to display ornamental jewelry. The major activities in this line of business revolve around navel piercing, cartilage, rook, nostril, eyebrow, daith, lip, tragus, earlobe, and facial piercing.
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Open a Nail Salon
A nail salon is yet another business opportunity to start in Birmingham. A nail salon or nail bar is a specialty beauty salon that offers nail care services such as manicures, pedicures, and nail enhancements. Traditional nail salons focus on manicures, pedicures, treating and painting nails. Nail salons also offer skincare services. People who work at nail salons are usually called nail technicians, manicurists, or nailists.
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Open a Beauty (Day) Spa
Opening a beauty spa is yet another business opportunity that is thriving in Birmingham. A beauty spa provides a variety of services for the purpose of improving health, beauty, and relaxation through personal care treatments.
Body treatments may include a sauna, whirlpool, jet bath, steam room, massage, mud bath, salt scrub, seaweed body wraps, clay or herbal body masks, reflexology, and waxing. Beauty spas also usually offer nail services, such as manicures, pedicures, and paraffin treatments.
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Open Pool and Billiard Hall
A pool and billiard hall is another good business opportunity to start in Birmingham. Remember, people visit pool and billiard halls not just to play games, but also to rent the latest gaming machines they do not have or can’t afford, and equally to network with like minded people. In case you don’t know, most pool and billiard halls start making profits within a few months of establishment.
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Start a Cleaning Service
If you are thinking of starting a business in Birmingham, one of the businesses to think of is a cleaning services business. This type of business can be started by anybody as long as you have eyes for details and cleanliness. The truth is that in Birmingham, you can easily succeed in a cleaning services business if you have good marketing skills and the ability to thoroughly carry out cleaning jobs.
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Open a Barber’s Shop
A barber shop is another good business opportunity that is thriving in Birmingham. If you are in the United Kingdom, you are expected to attend a “Barber School”, that’s only when you can acquire your license and permit. Besides, most cities in the United Kingdom require a barber to possess a license before they can be allowed to practice barbering professionally. People also learn the trade by understudying professional barbers in their shops.
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Handyman (Plumbing) Services
A handyman business is yet another business opportunity that is thriving in Birmingham. A handyman is one that provides a wide range of services needed for the maintenance of buildings and properties. The services provided by a handyman include plumbing, electrical works, carpentry, painting, heating, and cooling services, and other building and property maintenance and repair works.
To succeed in the business, you should try as much as possible not to reject jobs from clients as some jobs might be seen as too small for you to accept. Doing the small jobs is what often opens the way for bigger contracts.
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Pest Control Services Company
The pest control service is yet another good business opportunity anyone can start in Birmingham. It is important to state that before you can start a pest control business in the United Kingdom, you must apply for a pest control license and pass an exam to demonstrate your ability to properly handle chemicals and other means to exterminate pests properly.
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Educational Consultancy Business
The United Kingdom happens to be one of the most sought after countries for international students; they boast of having some of the best universities in the world. This means that the educational consultancy business is a thriving business opportunity in Birmingham.
Being an educational consultant means that you will help your clients handle all their educational concerns and help them gain admission to colleges or universities of their choice. You can also help your clients (international students) obtain work permits in their new country of residence or studies.
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Mobile Coffee Truck Business
A mobile coffee truck business is one of the good business opportunities that are thriving in Birmingham. If you are interested in starting a mobile coffee trucking business, then you must ensure that you have a wide variety of coffee and snacks to go with it.
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Airport Bus Shuttle Services
Airport bus shuttle service is yet another highly profitable business opportunity in Birmingham. Airport shuttle service is all about transporting passengers and their luggage from their hotels to the airport and vice versa. Depending on the kind of permit you obtained to operate your airport shuttle, you would need to acquire a standard and comfortable automobile for this kind of service.
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Open a Vintage Store
A vintage store business is yet another good business opportunity anyone can start in Birmingham. The market for vintage clothes and related antiques has continued to soar. Interestingly, the vintage store is one business that can’t go out of fashion because people would always appreciate ancient clothes and related fashion stuff. Depending on the scale you want to start, the startup capital for this type of business can range from low to moderate.
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Watch and Jewelry Repair Store
One cool way of making money in Birmingham is to start a watch and jewelry repair business. This business is a thriving one because one out of two persons that you come across has one or more jewelry that they make use of on a regular basis. The truth is that when jewelry is used, there are tendencies for them to wear out or get damaged hence the need for the services of jewelry repair shops.
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Open an Antique Store
An antique mall is yet another good business opportunity that can thrive in Birmingham. Antiques stores retail or auction antiques and collectibles, such as coins, jewelry, books, figurines, and memorabilia. The market for antiques and collectibles will keep rising as long as we have people who appreciate it.
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Open a Sports Retail Shop
Another highly thriving business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham is a sports retail shop. Sports retail shops mainly retail new sporting goods, such as bicycles, camping equipment, exercise, and fitness equipment, apparel, footwear, and other sporting goods and accessories. Supplies are sourced from sporting goods manufacturers and wholesalers and then sold to the general public via retail stores.
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Become a Football Scout
Becoming a football scout is of course one of the best business opportunities in Birmingham. Today, the city is home to two of the country’s oldest professional football teams: Aston Villa F.C., which was founded in 1874 and plays at Villa Park; and Birmingham City F.C., which was founded in 1875 and plays at St Andrew’s. Becoming a football scout is one of the coolest ways of making money from soccer without being a football player.
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Tour Guide
One of the thriving business opportunities in Birmingham is to become a tour guide. All that is required to run this type of business is to ensure that you can speak at least one or more foreign languages; it could be French, Spanish, Chinese, Portuguese, or German. Furthermore, you must also know the terrain pretty well.
Once you are certain that you can effectively translate or interpret, then all you need to do is to position yourself in places where you can have access to tourists; it could be in a hotel lobby (you would have to negotiate with the hotel manager) or via referrals from a travel and tour company.
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Start a Graffiti Removal Business
A graffiti removal business is yet another thriving business opportunity that an entrepreneur can start in Birmingham. A graffiti removal business is really profitable if you work directly for the government of your country as their agent.
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Open an Auto Painting Workshop
Another viable and money-spinning business opportunity that an aspiring entrepreneur can start in Birmingham is an auto painting workshop. An auto painting workshop is a workshop where automobiles are sprayed. The fact that owners of automobiles would want to make their cars look presentable and newer after using the car for a while means that there is a huge market for auto painting workshops in Birmingham.
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Go into House Painting Business
The house painting business is yet another lucrative business opportunity that an entrepreneur can start in Birmingham. Painting of a building is one of the finishing touches that are carried out after construction jobs have been completed or before a new tenant moves into an apartment, office, or shop. This goes to show that there are loads of business opportunities for professional painters.
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Start Hotdog and Sausage Cart Business
A hotdog and sausage cart business is yet another business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham. An entrepreneur can successfully start a hotdog and sausage cart business in the corner of a busy street or on a mobile shop without breaking the bank for cash. You only need to know how to make the tastiest hotdogs, get yourself a cart, then you are good to go.
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Open a Bar & Grill Business
A bar and grill business is no doubt a good business opportunity to start in Birmingham. Opening a bar and grill restaurant might not be entirely easy, but one thing is certain, it is a straight-forward business that can generate huge and steady profits if well positioned and properly managed.
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Start a Car Leather Repair Business
A car leather repair business is yet another good business opportunity to start in Birmingham. Most cars usually come with leather interiors and when these leather interiors are exposed to sun or heat, they tend to wear off, have holes, stains, drastic color loss, cracks, etc. hence the need for the services of car leather repair shop.
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Start a Dryer Vent Cleaning Business
As an aspiring entrepreneur who intends to start a business in Birmingham, you can comfortably start a dryer vent cleaning business without much stress. The truth is that you don’t necessarily need to own a fully functional dry-cleaning business before you can make money from your dryer vent cleaning business. Most people find it difficult to clean the vents of their dryers; hence they need professionals to help do it.
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Open a Juice and Smoothie Bar
A juice and smoothie bar is yet another thriving business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham. Juice and smoothie bars basically make and retail smoothies and fresh juices. Juice drink is one commodity that is consumed in all parts of the world and those that are in the business of producing juice drinks, are known to generate sales year in year out if the business is properly managed.
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Open a Wine Bar
Another good business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham is a wine bar business. A wine bar is a bar or small restaurant where wine is the main drink available; a characteristic feature of many standard wine bars is a wide selection of assorted wines available by the glass. Just ensure that you make available assorted red wines, white wines, nonalcoholic beverages, beer and liquor, beers, etc.
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Start a Fruit and Vegetable Retail Store Business
If you are considering starting a fruit and vegetable retail business in Birmingham, the good news is that you can’t get it wrong. This is because various types of vegetables and fruits are consumed by almost everybody in Birmingham. It is important to state that starting a vegetable and fruit retail business comes with its own fair share of challenges, but that does not rule out the fact that it is a profitable business venture.
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Open a Gift Shop
Another popular business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham is a gift shop. Gift shops retail a range of gifts like; gift wrap, novelty merchandise, souvenirs, greeting cards, party supplies, seasonal and holiday decorations.
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Open a Flower Shop
If you have eyes for colors and designs, as well as have a penchant for beauty, then you may want to tinker with starting your own flower shop in Birmingham. The market for both fresh and artificial flowers has continued to soar because we still have weddings, burials, and other special events taking place all around us. The fact remains that as insignificant as most people think the flower is, it is still a major requirement for weddings, burials, love gatherings and even worship centers.
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Open a Shoe Retail Store
One of the easiest and perhaps popular business opportunities in Birmingham that you will surely find loads of entrepreneurs involved in is running a shoe retail store. Shoe stores purchase footwear from wholesalers and retail them directly to end-users.
If you are interested in starting a shoe retail business, one of the things you need to put in place in order to keep welcoming a wide range of customers is to stock a wide range of shoes and other footwear from different manufacturing companies both within and outside the United Kingdom.
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Haulage Services
A haulage service business is yet another business opportunity that an entrepreneur who is interested in making money should consider starting Birmingham. The haulage business is all about transporting goods from one location to another. As a matter of fact, it is economical for the manufacturing industry to contract the transportation of their raw materials and finished goods to haulage companies.
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Sale and Servicing of Office Equipment and Machines
Sell and servicing of office equipment and machines is yet another profitable business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham. Printers, photocopy machines, routers, scanners, laminating machines et al are all machines that once in a while needs to be serviced in order to perform effectively.
So, if you have the related technical training, then you should consider going into the sale and servicing of office equipment and machines. All you need to do is to be aggressive in marketing your services, especially to SMEs; they are the people that need your services the most.
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Tax Consulting Business
The issue of tax is a serious one because there are severe penalties if any organization or even individual is found to have evaded tax. Most startups and even bigger organizations find it convenient to contract all their tax-related issues to tax consultants.
So, if you are looking for a business opportunity to start in Birmingham, then one of your options should be to start a tax consulting business. Please note that starting this type of business requires professional certifications and relevant experience in taxation.
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Corporate Training and Human Resource Consulting Business
Another profitable business opportunity that an entrepreneur who has robust experience in human resources should consider starting in Birmingham is corporate training and human resource consulting business. There are several corporate organizations out there who find it convenient to contract their human resources jobs to professionals.
Although there are several corporate training and human resource consulting firms in Birmingham, if you are able to come up with a unique approach to training, then you are likely not going to struggle to gain your own fair share of the existing market.
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Start an Auditing Firm
Are you a trained and chartered accountant? Do you intend to start your own business in Birmingham? If you are able to answer yes to these questions, then you should consider starting an auditing firm. Auditing firms help both small and large organizations audit their accounts and prepare their books. Just like most consulting businesses, an auditing firm is a core professional business that can only be run by chattered accountants or auditors.
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Start a Courier Services Business
Another thriving and profitable business opportunity that an entrepreneur who is serious about making money should consider starting in Birmingham is a courier service business. There are indeed loads of business opportunities for courier services, especially in cities where business activities are booming, and of course, Birmingham is one of them.
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Air Condition Installation and Servicing Business
Air-condition installation and servicing business is yet another highly profitable and thriving business opportunity that an entrepreneur should consider starting in Birmingham. This type of business requires technical skills hence if you are looking towards starting this type of business, you should ensure that you have acquired training and exposure.
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Recruitment Consulting Business
It is normal for most organizations to contract the recruitment of their employees to recruitment experts so that they can concentrate on their core duties. So, if you have experience in recruitment, then one of the business opportunities you should consider starting in Birmingham is a recruitment consulting business.
This type of business is highly profitable because of the number of people out there looking for paid employment. Please note that before you can successfully launch this type of business, you must have acquired the relevant certifications and qualifications.
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Office Support Business
Another easy-to-start business opportunity that an entrepreneur can start in Birmingham is the office support business. Office support businesses offer a wide range of services such as data entry, web updating, running errands, distribution of fliers and research jobs et al.
This type of business is profitable especially if you offer numerous office support services and if your business is located close to the hub of business in your country or city. Just ensure that you market your services to both startups and established businesses and you will surely secure more than a handful of business deals.
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Start an Interior Decoration Business
An interior decoration business is a thriving business opportunity that an entrepreneur who is serious about making money should consider starting in Birmingham. Interior decoration is all about giving our homes, offices, and buildings facelifts; they are involved in various activities ranging from color selections, lighting selections, blind selections amongst others.
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Start a Beer Retailing Business
Pubs, bars and hangout joints are known for the retailing of beers. There is a large market for beers not just in Birmingham but also all across the United Kingdom.
If you are looking for a thriving business opportunity to start in Birmingham, then you should consider opening a beer bar where beers from various brands will be retailed directly to consumers. If your bar is located in a safe environment, you won’t struggle to attract customers on a regular basis.
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Open a Retail Pharmacy Store
Another ideal business opportunity that is bound to do pretty well in Birmingham is a retail pharmacy store. If you are a licensed pharmacist and you are looking towards starting a business as against working for someone, then you should consider opening a retail pharmacy store.
This type of business is highly profitable if well located. Before you can start this type of business however, you will be required to secure permits and license from the regulatory bodies in your county or city.
- Open a Boutique
A boutique business is yet another thriving business opportunity that can be started in Birmingham. All that is required to launch this type of business is a store that is well-positioned and money to stock your boutique with different types, colors, shapes, and designs of clothes and fashion accessories from different clothing labels/designers.
The truth is that, if your boutique is well located and well stocked with quality clothes and fashion accessories, you are likely not going to struggle to attract customers.
- Open a Bookshop
If you are considering starting a retailing business in Birmingham, then one of your options is to open a bookshop; a store where books of different genres from different authors are sold. There is a large market for books especially if you have done your homework before stocking your bookshop with books.
If you are considering starting this type of business, it will be to your advantage to also have an online bookshop in addition to your brick an mortar bookshop. It will give the online community an opportunity to patronize your bookshop.
- Open a Vegetable and Fruit Mart
If you are looking towards starting a thriving business as an entrepreneur and you live in a community in Birmingham where you can easily have access to fresh vegetables and fruits, then you should consider opening a vegetable and fruit mart. It is indeed a simple business that requires little start-up capital, and any serious-minded entrepreneur can successfully run this type of business.
- Open an Ice Cream Shop
Ice cream shop is another easy-to-start business opportunity that any serious-minded entrepreneur can successfully start in Birmingham. It is a business that requires little training and skills to set up and manage.
If you are looking towards starting this type of business, and you don’t have the skills, you can quickly learn the skills, it is likely not going to take you more than a week to learn how to make different flavors of ice cream. Even if you don’t have the required capital to rent and equip a shop, you can operate a mobile ice cream shop.
- Property Management Company
Property management which is a subset of the real estate industry is perhaps one of the easiest and most affordable real estate businesses to start. It is basically about lease contracting or accepting rent using legal documents approved for the area in which the property is located.
In a nutshell, property management companies are responsible for taking care of and managing buildings and other real estate properties for individuals (landlords) or for groups of owners.
If an aspiring entrepreneur who intends to start his or her own property management business has the right connections, networks, managerial skills, and takes delight in managing real estate for clients, then he or she is going to find a property management business very rewarding.
- Start a Construction Cleaning Business
Another thriving and indeed profitable business venture that an entrepreneur who is interested in starting a business in Birmingham should consider is a construction cleaning business.
It is the practice for pre-construction cleaning to be carried out in a proposed construction site before the commencement of proper construction work. After the construction, post-construction cleaning is expected to be carried out before the facility is commissioned or open for rental or leasing.
- Start a Roof Maintenance and Restoration Business
Roof maintenance and restoration business is yet another profitable and thriving business that an aspiring entrepreneur can successfully start in Birmingham. No doubt roofs are subject to wear and tear due to exposure to harsh climatic conditions which is why after a period of time you will find out that a roof is leaking when it rains. It is the duty of roof maintenance and restoration companies to help fix leakages in roofs and also to replace worn-out roofs with new ones.
- Start Swimming Pool Construction and Maintenance Business
Swimming pool construction and maintenance is yet another thriving business opportunity that an entrepreneur who is interested in starting a business in Birmingham should consider. It is safe to classify swimming pool construction and maintenance under the real estate industry because of the nature of the job that is done during the maintenance of swimming pools and the fact that the largest market for this type of business is from major players or investors in the real estate industry.