If women set up businesses at the same rate as men there would be an extra one million active entrepreneurs in the UK. But even today, setting up a business is often not as straight-forward for female entrepreneurs as it is for their male counterparts. 

For example, they often find it harder to find investment, lack the types of support networks that men often have, and face resistance in some more conservative environments. 

Still, more women than ever are breaking down these barriers. But what can we do to take this trend even further?

The women-supporting-women movement is currently in its nascent stages. This is unsurprising since, in general, women old enough to be in a position to financially support today’s female entrepreneurs belonged to a generation in which business-minded women were unlikely to flourish – which means there aren’t many of them.

But, as more women succeed in business, more are able to help their successors – and not just financially.

Although female angel investors are becoming more common, so are female business support networks and mentoring schemes.

And the women-supporting-women movement is not limited to female entrepreneurs helping fellow female entrepreneurs: as more women assume senior positions in major corporations, some of the prejudices surrounding companies engaging women-led suppliers and contractors will also begin to breakdown.

At this point it does seems like the tide is changing, but there’s still a long way to go before women are equally represented in the entrepreneurial space.

With this in mind, perhaps the biggest motivation for women is inspiration. And there’s a lot of inspiring entrepreneurial women to choose from.

From Roberta Lucca of Wonderluk to Nicola McClafferty of Covetique, and from Nancy Tilbury from Studio XO to Nathalie Gaveau of Shopcade, women all over the UK are proving that being a female entrepreneur is not only possible, but exciting.

What do you think we can do to help female entrepreneurs?

And which female entrepreneurs inspire you? Email us your thoughts.   

Images courtesy of BodyDataSpace