Harborne businesses vote 'YES' to become Birmingham’s 12th BID!

The way to get started is to quit talking and start doing

The Harborne Business Association (HBA) are pleased to announce Harborne Village has achieved Business Improvement District (BID) status with a victory of 69% votes in favour of investing in their local community.

A Business Improvement District (BID) is part of the Government’s strategy to encourage business communities to work together to bring improvements and initiatives to be enjoyed by the local area.

Harborne joins other Business Improvement District’s across Birmingham such as; Jewellery Quarter, Sutton Coldfield, Southside, Acocks Green, Erdington and Northfield to name a few.

The Harborne Business Association has been working with Harborne businesses for the past 10 months to become the city’s next BID. The local businesses based within the BID boundary have been voting over the last 4 weeks as to whether they wish to invest in improvements and initiatives such as; safety & security, marketing, community events, Christmas lights as well as a dedicated BID manager to coordinate the projects.

Chair of Harborne Business Association and Manager of Waitrose, Harborne, Barry Griffiths said;

'This is such an exciting time for Harborne, we so pleased that local businesses have come together as a community to become the city’s next BID.

Harborne is a great community, with a brilliant mix of businesses, however, like with many local shopping areas we have had some real challenges which needed attention. Now, with the support of the local business community, we can begin to address and resolve these issues.

The yes vote is a result of a lot of hard work by a lot of brilliant people, from business owners, managers and community members, most of whom have even volunteered their spare time to help in the campaign.

We are thrilled with the result and very excited to get started on the next stages of our BID development!’

The Harborne Business Association appointed Kate Smart, with 4 years experience in BID Management, to help develop the BID. The campaign was by assisted by Tiger Bam Communications, who have handled Business Improvement District’s communication strategies for the past 5 years.

Harborne Business association will now work with the city council to put in place the legal framework to officially become a Business Improvement District on January 1st 2018.

Detailed figures for the vote were: