The Lilac Review: Amelia's Insight into the Final Report

Last month, over 200 disabled founders gathered to hear the final report The Lilac Review UK in partnership with Lloyds Business & Commercial and Small Business Britain in the House of Lords. Our co founder Amelia was invited to attend and has shared more about this incredible initiative and the significant impact it has had.

Many of you have followed The Lilac Review over the last 18 months, it has been quite an incredible initiative which I want to share in the hope it may help someone reading this.  My involvement and passion for this review has been driven by a genuine understanding that running your own business with a disability, is phenomenal. In comparison to employment which remains predominantly inaccessible and something I really struggled with, being a founder has given me independence, purpose and confidence in spades. So, here's hoping by reading this, you too see that starting or growing a business as not only a feasible option, but an attractive and exciting one!

Amelia at Downing Street for the launch of The Lilac Review in February 2024 wearing Emerald Sky

The Lilac Review started in February 2024 and in a nutshell it has transformed accessibility in business for disabled entrepreneurs! As someone who runs their own business and only really took that on because employment wasn’t accessible and as a result, sustainable for me - this has had a phenomenal impact on me personally, but also our business.

Before The Lilac Review launched:

• Disabled founders made up 25% of founders in the UK but only generated 9% of small business revenue

The Lilac Review research revealed this was because:

• Finance was excluding us (as a female disabled founder my statistical chances of securing VC investment are 0.005%)
• Networking was not accessible - nearly always in person, involved extensive travel and often hosted in inaccessible venues using inaccessible methods of communication
• Business growth programmes were inaccessible to disabilities, made to be long, intense and honestly likely to make the most robust founder ill

The result? We do less, we learn slower, we grow slower which means we generate significantly less revenue than non disabled founders.

This is incredibly frustrating because the stats on disabled founder value demonstrate we offer significantly better results when running a business, more specifically:

Research carried out by Yale University, Open Inclusion, and The Valuable 500 cited disabled founded businesses generate:

• 2.6 x more net income
• 2 x more economic profit 

Amelia attending the final report of The Lilac Review wearing our Classic Silver Diamanté Crutch

The Lilac Review in partnership with Small Business Britain, Lloyds Bank and supported by the UK government, has put significant time and resources into finding out what barriers disabled entrepreneurs face that prevent revenue generation and most importantly, how we can remove them.  Unlocking a potential £230billion for the UK economy if successful, has meant a huge opportunity to help.

Amelia attending the final report of The Lilac Review wearing our Classic Silver Diamanté Crutch

The work carried out over the last 18 months has driven new initiatives to open doors for disabled founders to start and scale their own businesses with less barriers, more opportunity and growth.

As a direct result of The Lilac Review we now have:

⚡️A Disability Finance Code - all major UK banks have signed to say they will ensure all new and existing services and products will be specifically designed with disabled as part of their creation, for disabled people to easily use

⚡️A disability trade framework to open up existing contracts inc govt ones (imagine our crutches in the NHS!!) to disabled founders

⚡️The Lilac Centre for Disabled Entrepreneurs - a hub for growth with workshops, mentorship and financial support for starting and scaling a business with a disability

I can’t even begin to explain how important The Lilac Review has been for the disabled community, but also everyone - by making things simpler, better and more open to more people it means everyone will see starting a business as an opportunity, more will do it and more will do it at scale!

Amelia pictured alongside Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and fabulous disabled founder Mark Williams from Limbart

Personally it has given me a wide group of disabled entrepreneurs to connect with, work with and share the realities of running a business whilst also managing a chronic illness.  I am so keen to work with as many disabled founded businesses as possible and am delighted that so many of our lovely customers are part of the community including Paul Woods from Proactive Despatch (who now manage all of our same day couriers), Mark Esho and Victoria Jenkins from Unhidden. But also so many new friends running phenomenal businesses to support disabled people including Hayley Kennard from Dotty About Braille, Seema Flower, Joseph Williams from Clu, Richard Liverman from Richer Solutions, Sarah Berthon from Excel Against the Odds, Funmi Lawal from Clip Knix and more.

Taking on Cool Crutches & Walking Sticks full time changed my life - it’s been the first time l’ve loved my job and I think that’s why I’m good at it. I have honestly loved it and my only dream is that everyone reading this starts to see doing the same is a really strong, viable option for them too - not in spite of their disability, but as a result of it!  You only need to click on any one of the above founders or businesses to see the incredible value we bring with every step.

Game on, it’s just the beginning 🚀

To find out more about The Lilac Review and how you can get involved please visit https://lilacreview.com/.

A big thank you to the team from Small Business Britain and Lloyds Business Banking for believing in us, investing in us and helping us to succeed.