ALMOST half of businesses in Morpeth and the surrounding area are home based, according to a new survey.
And in a separate study by the Centre for Rural Economy at Newcastle University, members of the Morpeth and District Chamber of Trade thought that having a collective voice was the main benefit.
The organisation also said the relationships with lo
cal councils are positive, but is unhappy with the support provided by regional agencies.
The university team asked a range of questions to businesses in the North East including the NE61 post code zone and outlying areas, which provided 118 responses.
It found that 46 per cent of these are home-based and a significant number of 'in-migrants' from outside the area own them.
A total of 88 per cent said they had access to broadband, although only 66.7 per cent said it was adequate for their future needs, with good IT systems and the availability of local training identified as important to future business growth.
Shortage of finance and too much regulation were mentioned as the main areas to restrict their growth, as well as the recession.
Postgraduate researcher Robert Newbery, from the Centre for Rural Economy, said: "The figure for home-based businesses in this area is very interesting and more needs to be done on finding out their aims and needs."
The second survey was of local trade and tourism groups in northern England, including the Morpeth, Penrith and Haltwhistle Chambers, Rothbury and Coquetdale Business Club and the Alnwick Tourism Association.
In terms of relevance of benefits to members, 79 per cent of the respondents from the Morpeth group said it provided a collective voice and 70 percent a contact network.
Less than half (49.6 per cent) said it provided new customer contacts and just 56.2 per cent said greater visibility to customers.
Members generally agreed that the organisation had not improved their business performance, but had improved the economic viability and community vitality of the town and surrounding area.
They also said working with Morpeth Town Council, the former Castle Morpeth Council and Northumberland County Council had a positive impact and dealings with One North East, Business Link and the government were negative.
Mr Newbery said: "The results show that the Morpeth Chamber and other groups are less about the individual business and more about making improvements for all businesses in the town.
"Everyone seems not to get on with the government and have good relationships with local authorities, but dealing with regional agencies varies from group to group.
"The Morpeth Chamber feels that these organisations focus on certain areas and not theirs, and believes they should come along and talk to them more than they are doing at the moment."
Morpeth and District Chamber of Trade Chairman Stuart Lishman said: "We found the results of these surveys very interesting and we would encourage the university to follow this up with more research.
"We will discuss these findings at our next meeting in January."
