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Is Anybody Safe from AI in the Workplace?

Posted on by Clive Reffell

We’ve all seen the clickbait media headlines about AI’s impact on recruitment policies. Growing levels of graduates cannot find what they consider to be appropriate employment, at the same time as many companies are scaling down the places available on their graduate training schemes. How about the people already in what appears to be a successful career? In how many instances will AI force career changes.

Many parents may see their grown-up kids facing this situation after leaving uni, and saddled with debt. But before long, it could be impacting them directly as well.

A growing body of research suggests that AI isn’t simply automating the bottom of the labour pyramid. It’s climbing fast, and some of its steepest gains are happening precisely in the cognitive, analytical, and communicative tasks that define senior business roles. Younger workers are adapting. Retirees are out of the equation. In between, executives and managers aged 40 and over, who have built careers on expertise, judgement, and institutional knowledge, may be facing the most disorienting disruption of all.

You’re 47, 52, or 57 years old. You’ve spent two decades or more earning seniority the hard way: reading markets, managing teams, navigating boardrooms, and developing the kind of judgment that can’t be learned from a course.

You’re not naive about AI. You’ve read the headlines, sat through the strategy decks, maybe even signed off on a few AI pilots in your department. You assumed the disruption would happen below you, to people with the more routine roles involving repetitive work.

You thought you were safe from AI because you have built a value proposition based on three pillars:

  • depth of domain expertise,
  • a network of professional relationships,
  • judgment that comes from years of pattern recognition.

All three are real and hard-won. All three are also, to varying degrees, being replicated or replaced by AI tools available to anyone with an internet connection. This means many things are going to change, and many people will face the demands and turmoil of a drastic career change.

It seems an appropriate time for me to blow the dust off a set of 10 recommendations on how to manage a career change. I wrote and published this list over 10 years ago after attending an event covering the challenges facing former company directors who were changing career – not necessarily of their own choice – to ‘go it alone’. This could mean starting a new business, investing in other people’s new businesses, or taking interim roles to guide companies unable to afford their experience and knowledge on a full-time basis.

  1. It’s scary to be in a new place. Doing new things, outside of a comfort zone that may have previously been full of support, is very tough.
  2. Many of your previous contacts become useless after a career change because they were part of that former comfort zone, that former life.
  3. It’s difficult to achieve a target daily pay rate, so do what comes up that looks like it would be good to be involved with.
  4. Don’t forget that time is your most precious asset, particularly if you are starting a new enterprise later in life.
  5. Reconsider the people who you know. Build connections among a new group of people who are going to be able to help the new you.
  6. Think also about how to help them, not only how they could help you. Support is a two-way street.
  7. Remain curious and love learning, which is now easier than it ever was.
  8. Add practice to your knowledge, by simply getting out there to start providing others with the benefits of your knowledge and skills. Even do it free for a local charity or good cause rather than keep them to yourself. This will help teach you how to best present that knowledge in a way that builds confidence.
  9. Confidence is what your new customers or investors will recognise and buy in to.
  10. Work with people you like, who respect you and pay you on time. Life’s too short to do otherwise.

I would now add to this list, learn to use AI tools that will maximise your efficiency and multiply your effectiveness to prospective clients. AI by itself doesn’t take jobs away. People who use AI will replace people who don’t.

For some people it can represent liberation, freedom to pursue personal ambitions rather than play it safe. It worked that way for Nik Storonsky, the co-founder of Revolut. He was one of the former workers at Lehmann Brothers in Canary Wharf. One of the people carrying their personal items in a cardboard box as they left the building for the last time after it collapsed in the global financial crash in 2008.

He had experienced the delays and excessive fees for changing currency for his numerous business trips, and his family visits back to Moscow. He came up with Revolut, and ran some early stage crowdfudning to get the ball rolling. Today, Revolut has over 70 million customers, supports money transfers across more than 160 countries and regions, and it was valued at $75 billion in November 2025.

If you have ideas of what you want to do and achieve, and crowdfunding could be a source of finance for your startup, please drop me a line or give me a call. Let’s see how much I can help and support you. I am an independent crowdfunding advisor, without the restriction of ties to any specific crowdfunding platform.

BrewDog and “Equity for Punks”: A Cautionary Tale About Crowdfunding

Posted on by Clive Reffell

The big news in the crowdfunding sector in March 2026 was the collapse of the UK-based craft beer company BrewDog. In a series of equity crowdfunding rounds spanning more than a decade, over 220,000 retail investors had put approximately £75 million into the business. They called themselves “Equity Punks.” They believed they were joining a revolution. When the end came, they were left with nothing.

The Rise of “Community Capitalism”

BrewDog’s “Equity for Punks” model was genuinely innovative when it launched in 2009. Online crowdfunding was very new, and it allowed ordinary consumers to invest directly in a fast-growing consumer brand. The pitch blended investment with belonging. Shareholders received perks such as discounts in BrewDog bars, invitations to shareholder events and exclusive beers brewed for investors. Some enthusiasts went further, getting BrewDog tattoos that entitled them to lifetime discounts. In effect, BrewDog blurred the line between a loyalty programme and an equity investment. Fans became shareholders, and shareholders became brand ambassadors.

The founders had vowed to never spend a penny on paid-for advertising. Though they happily hired and branded a helicopter to make a video of parachuting “fat cats” (stuffed toys, I hasten to add) into the City of London to generate news coverage of the fact that they were crowdfunding. This first round of BrewDog crowdfunding went on to raise their first £5m – without the services of any expensive “fat cat” investment advisers.

The fledgling brand set a fundraising example that inspired several other brewers to go down the crowdfunding route, and whether they brewed craft or traditional beer didn’t seem to matter.

BrewDog’s blurring of identity and investment was, with hindsight, one of the central dangers of the whole enterprise. Their fundraising and generally irreverent marketing blurred the line between investment and identity. Investors were not just buying shares — they were buying into a movement. One time, to publicise opening a bar in north London, they hired a tank to motor through the streets of Camden.

As Dr Hadar Gafni, a lecturer in entrepreneurial finance at King’s College London, has pointed out, that distinction between investment and identity matters enormously: when people invest in a story rather than a set of financial fundamentals, they tend to ask fewer difficult questions. Is the company profitable? What protections do shareholders have? What happens if things go wrong?

The Annual General Meeting, typically a key moment for accountability, took the form of a music festival atmosphere. Investors who loved the brand were less inclined to scrutinise the financial structure behind their investment, or to fully understand it. BrewDog’s highly dispersed base of small retail investors had little collective power to influence the company’s direction. They were, as Dr Gafni put it bluntly, passengers.

The Deal That Changed Everything

In 2017, the two co-founders struck a deal with TSG Consumer Partners, a US private equity firm. TSG invested £213 million in BrewDog for a roughly 22% stake. The deal made the founders multimillionaires overnight — both James Watt and Martin Dickie reportedly pocketed around £50 million each from the transaction.

But the terms of that deal contained a structural time bomb for everyone else. TSG’s shares carried a liquidation preference and an 18% annual compound return, ensuring the firm would be paid ahead of ordinary shareholders. While this kind of arrangement is common in private equity, the consequence for BrewDog’s retail investors was profound: the bar for them to see any meaningful return was set extraordinarily high from that moment on. The “Equity Punks” had, knowingly or not, accepted a position at the back of the queue.

The compounding arithmetic was merciless. By 2024, the private equity firm was reportedly owed more than £700 million under the terms of the deal, alongside significant additional loans. The business was already in chronic decline. The gap between what TSG was owed and what the business was actually worth had become unbridgeable.

Chasing the Unicorn

In the years following the TSG deal, BrewDog’s ambitions became increasingly global. The company opened flagship bars around the world, launched hotels, expanded into spirits and continued promoting headline-grabbing marketing campaigns. Watt framed the strategy bluntly: BrewDog would either become a global success or “crash and burn.” Revenues grew rapidly and valuations were at one point claimed to reach £1.8 billion. But expansion proved ruinously expensive, and profitability remained elusive.

The company had last recorded a profit in 2019. BrewDog’s expansion-at-any-cost strategy, fuelled by significant amounts of debt, came home to roost quite spectacularly. Its share of UK beer sales never exceeded 5%. The question that goes largely unanswered is why a business with such a modest domestic market position felt justified in attempting to expand to as many as 100 venues globally. Ambitious debt-fuelled expansion plans, coupled with expensive flagship properties, proved unsustainable.

By late 2025, when both co-founders had departed the business within a year of each other — a development that left the writing clearly on the wall — the company was well on its way to recording a total loss approaching £500 million. When a company reaches that point, the fate of ordinary shareholders is essentially sealed.

The Collapse and Its Human Cost

The company was placed into administration and, having at one time been valued at over $1 billion, was acquired for just £33 million by US cannabis and wellness company Tilray Brands. The acquisition covered BrewDog’s global brand, intellectual property, UK brewing operations, and 11 top-performing venues, leaving behind the majority of the unprofitable bar estate and nearly 500 jobs. A total of 484 BrewDog employees were made redundant, breweries around the world were offloaded, and 38 bars were shut down.

Tilray CEO Irwin Simon has claimed the redundancies had “nothing to do with” them, and the company has suggested it is exploring franchising opportunities that could see some bars reopen under new operators. Whether that materialises remains to be seen. The immediate reality for nearly 500 workers — and for the communities that had invested in both the brand and the business — was stark.

For BrewDog’s retail investors, the outcome was complete. More than 200,000 retail investors, BrewDog’s self-styled “equity punks”, had collectively invested around £75 million into the company. They received perks, discounts and a sense of belonging. What they did not receive was any return when the company was sold. A few years of discounted products were the only tangible financial benefit most of them ever enjoyed.

What the Research Tells Us

The BrewDog story is not unique in the crowdfunding world, but it is unusually vivid. Entrepreneurial finance lecturer Dr Gafni, who has been researching crowd-based investment alongside colleagues at Copenhagen Business School, offers a measured but important observation. The finding is not that crowds are irrational. In fact, they can be remarkably good at separating promising investments from poor ones — but only under the right conditions. Investors need access to clear financial information and a diversity of perspectives.

When a pitch leans heavily on community, identity or shared values, investors tend to make more aligned rather than diverse assessments. Enthusiasm becomes contagious. Critical judgement is crowded out.BrewDog was a textbook case. The very things that made it such a compelling fundraising vehicle — the culture, the community, the anti-establishment energy — were the things that made its investors least likely to ask the hard questions that might have protected them.

What Needs to Change

The collapse has renewed calls for tighter regulation of equity crowdfunding, and the debate is a live one. Critics have long pointed to the sector’s structural weaknesses: investments in businesses with inflated valuations; shares that are highly illiquid and extremely difficult to trade; the vulnerability of retail investors to terms struck with later institutional investors who move to the front of the repayment queue; and the limited accountability structures of privately owned companies with dispersed ownership bases.

The more important issue, however, may be one of design rather than simply regulation. If companies want to raise money from retail investors, the risks need to be impossible to miss, not buried in small print. Financial information should be standardised, prominent and clearly separated from marketing. At present, there is often no effective barrier between the two.

Retail investors should also recognise that share ownership carries governance implications: when a company’s ownership is fragmented among thousands of small shareholders, meaningful oversight of management can be weak or effectively absent. Liquidity is another factor that deserves far more prominence in how crowdfunded investments are presented. Shares in crowdfunded companies are typically difficult to sell, meaning investors may have to hold them for years with little ability to exit. In BrewDog’s case, shareholders could trade their shares only occasionally through a specialised platform, and even then there was no guarantee of finding a buyer.

The Lessons for Investors

Some say equity crowdfunding has always carried these risks: illiquid positions; inflated valuations; susceptibility to institutional deals that demote retail investors; and limited recourse against unregulated private company founders. Some want it more tightly regulated. Both positions have merit.

But for investors who had been sitting on a valuable paper profit, the most personal and actionable lessons are different. Never take a paper valuation for granted, and never treat a crowdfunded investment as something you can simply file away and forget. BrewDog’s annual reports showed clearly that the company had not made a profit since 2019. That information was available to anyone paying attention.

The final chance to take advantage of a share buy-back scheme had been in 2022. That provided a window of at least three years in which a paying-attention investor could have made a decision to realise at least some level of return before the end came. The question worth asking — uncomfortably — is how many Equity Punks were actually watching.

Crowdfunding can work. It has genuinely helped hundreds of businesses reach early-stage capital they could not have accessed through conventional routes. But it requires investors who approach it with the same discipline they would bring to any other financial decision: read the accounts, understand the capital structure, know who gets paid first if things go wrong, and recognise that loyalty to a brand and sound investment practice are two very different things.

Why Has Equity Crowdfunding Been Declining?

Posted on by Clive Reffell

In November 2025 I posted a question on my X account that was prompted by the apparent declining popularity of equity crowdfunding in the UK. Data company Beauhurst had tracked the number and total value of equity crowdfunding projects on an annual basis. Crowdfunding Insider picked up on my initial question, and clarified the decline in their own article: “The number of online securities offerings dropped to its lowest level [in 2024] since 2014. In 2021, investment crowdfunding peaked at 569 funding rounds. In 2024, there were just 297—almost half as many. The amount raised is also heading down; in 2021, £773 million was raised online, and only £324 million in 2024.”

It continued a theme I had started in April 2025, and I want to take a few moments to share what I believe are key reasons for the decline.

End of Low Inflation and Interest Rates

When Crowdcube and Seedrs (now Republic) started in the UK we were experiencing a period of almost zero inflation. The Net Present Value calculations of my Open University course seemed hardly necessary. It was more straightforward to assess a pitching company’s financials and reach a decision to invest, or not. It was also far cheaper to borrow money, if that’s what anyone wanted to do to make investments.

The return of both inflation and higher interest rates has complicated the equations. This is particularly clear when looking at return rates on debt crowdfunding (P2P lending).

Low Levels of Investor Success

Luke Lang, co-founder of Crowdcube, once said that the key measure of equity crowdfunding’s success was not the sums raised by startup business founders, it should be the returns enjoyed by investors. Without a base of retail investors it cannot work.

Equity crowdfunding is a high-risk investment. The FCA advises that nobody should have more than 10% of an investment portfolio in high risk sectors. Nevertheless, success stories appear few and far between. Early investors in Revolut, for example, include a number of paper-millionaires. If only – they wish – Nik Storonsky would buy back all their shares, or let them be sold on secondary markets.

A dozen UK investor success stories are in an article I wrote for the Crowdsourcing Week platform. That’s less than one per year since Crowdcube and Seedrs launched.

Alternative Retail Investment Opportunities

These are easy to find. Gold has risen by 65% in the past 12 months. Bitcoin began the year at $94,000 and finished it around 7% lower. In between, it edged at one stage above $120,000. These investments are more liquid than equity crowdfunding, and independent valuation data adds transparency.

This year I have been contacted by people encouraging me to invest in artwork by up and coming artists, and in casks of whisky and property developments. Investments in such sectors are far more opaque, but it doesn’t necessarily mean equity crowdfunding is regarded by everyone as better or safer. This has contributed to the equity crowdfunding decline.

Lack of Trust and Transparency

Crowdfunding investors have plenty of right to feel aggrieved when they see the companies they backed go into Administration, and then are bought again by the original founder(s). Debts are written off, including crowdfunding investments.

It has happened to me. Although it is still trading, I did not make an effort this year to gift anything produced by the East London Liquor Company, or visit the distillery restaurant or bar. Investor discounts were not maintained. It is a true case of “all I got was the lousy t-shirt.”

I have seen newspaper reader comments when cases have been reported of original founders buying their business back from administrators. Accusations of theft and fraud are some of the milder comments. And there is always some input from the “I told you so” brigade who perhaps find glory in never taking a risk.

Who Speaks Up For Equity Crowdfunding?

The expected champion is the UK Crowdfunding Association. It was formed in 2013 with the purpose of promoting the interests of crowdfunding and alternative finance platforms, their investors, and clients. A section of its website is for Case Studies. In over 12 years of its existence it now has two.

If anyone from UKCFA reads this, I’d be very happy to help get the Case Studies up to a much more respectable level that demonstrates the multiple benefits, effectiveness, and flexibility of crowdfunding in a manner more appropriate to your mission.

Crowdfunding Shines for Families Struck by Tragedy: the Charlie Kirk Campaign

Posted on by Clive Reffell
Main image of a blog about crowdfunding for Charlie Kirk's family

Regardless of what you make of his political views, a crowdfunding campaign on GiveSendGo for U.S. conservative influencer Charlie Kirk skyrocketed to nearly $5 million in just days, showcasing the immense power of collective generosity. Kirk, 31, was fatally shot on September 10, 2025, while speaking at a Turning Point USA rally at Utah Valley University in Orem. A prominent commentator, frequent campus speaker, and close ally of President Trump, he left behind his wife, Erika, and two young children, aged 3 and 1. This outpouring, amplified by outlets like Newsweek, goes beyond fundraising—it’s a testament to community, remembrance, and resilience. Here’s why crowdfunding is uniquely suited for such causes.

A Beacon of Support in Crisis

Launched by ALP Pouches, a tobacco-free nicotine brand founded by former Fox News presenter Tucker Carlson in 2024, the campaign kicked off with a staggering $1 million pledge, followed by five additional $100,000 contributions from ALP. These pledges ensured the crowdfunding began with an immediate bang rather than a slow build-up, encouraging donations from the public that range from $5 to thousands, and reflect a universal desire to help. Carlson, leveraging his 16.6 million X followers, also shared a message viewed 5.5 million times, contributing to a viral wave of support.

Why Crowdfunding Excels for Tragic Losses

Crowdfunding is uniquely powerful for supporting families after a tragedy like this. Here’s why it’s a powerful tool:

  • Immediate Financial Relief: Funds provide instant support for funeral costs, medical bills, or living expenses, easing the burden on grieving families like Erika Kirk’s, who face sudden financial uncertainty.
  • Emotional Solidarity: Platforms like GiveSendGo double as digital memorials. Donors leave heartfelt messages, creating a Book of Remembrance. For example, an anonymous $15,000 donor wrote, “Charlie was one of the best of us… grateful to know he was immediately with Jesus.” A $10 donor added, “His faith in God… will never be forgotten.” These tributes offer emotional support, connecting mourners worldwide.
  • Viral Momentum: Crowdfunding harnesses the “gravity” of collective action. A $5 donor noted, “I couldn’t not support this unfairly stricken family.” The viral nature—fueled by high-profile endorsements like Carlson’s—drew in thousands, amplifying impact.
  • Accessibility for All: Donations as small as $5 allow anyone to contribute, democratising giving and ensuring broad participation, which reflects the widespread admiration for figures like Kirk.
  • Community Building: Campaigns foster a sense of shared purpose, uniting supporters around a cause. For Kirk’s family, this translates into a global network of encouragement, reinforcing their resilience.
  • Transparency and Trust: Reputable platforms like GiveSendGo ensure funds reach the family directly, with clear updates on totals and distribution, building donor confidence.

A Platform for Connection and Healing

The GiveSendGo campaign has become more than a fundraiser—it’s a space for supporters to share personal stories. A $5,000 donor reflected, “Charlie’s courage inspired me to stand for truth.” Another wrote, “His legacy lives on in our hearts.” These messages transform the campaign into a living tribute, helping Erika and the rest of Kirk’s family feel supported and comforted beyond dollars (which amounted to $5,470,637 by September 30).

In keeping with connection and healing, Erika gave the assassin her forgiveness, while President Trump called for the death penalty.

A Word of Caution: Avoiding Scams

Tragic events can attract fraudulent campaigns. Compared to equity crowdfunding, donation platforms have lighter due diligence. Before giving, verify the organiser (e.g., ALP Pouches’ legitimacy via Carlson’s endorsement) and check platform authentication. Stick to trusted sites like GiveSendGo or GoFundMe, and be wary of unverified copycat appeals.

Crowdfunding for Music Festivals

Posted on by Clive Reffell

Not much rivals the thrill of live performances. The raw energy of artists, booming sound systems, and dazzling visuals deliver an immersive sensory rush. From dancing to pulsating beats to discovering new bands, festivals offer a dynamic musical journey that streaming can’t replicate. Sometimes set in stunning locations, festivals offer a break from routine. Camping under stars or exploring vibrant festival grounds sparks adventure, while themed stages and interactive installations ignite imagination. Festivals also often showcase wider cultural experiences, such as food, art, and workshops. Despite these benefits and pleasures, the current economic climate means many smaller festivals are struggling to survive. Crowdfunding has long been part of the arts industry. Let’s look at some people and organisations that have used crowdfunding for music festivals as a way to secure their future.

Beyond securing money, a crowdfunding campaign also provides additional marketing and a more structured process through which to develop audiences, promote events, and share behind-the-scenes stories about how a project is shaping up.

The music festival marketplace

Festival performances are the main income stream for many artists and bands, since music download platforms greatly reduce their income potential from recorded music. For independent performers, they can be a gateway to greater recognition and more numerous followers. Festivals are therefore important for musicians and singers at all stages of their career.

By August, 40 festivals were cancelled or closed altogether in 2025. In 2024 it was 78, according to the Association of Independent Festivals (AIF). Like most parts of the hospitality and entertainment sectors, festivals have been hit hard by the dramatic rise in operating costs since Covid-19. Wages have risen sharply to compensate workers for the increased cost of living, and festivals have also been hit particularly hard as they tend to employ a larger share of lower paid or part-time staff. The minimum income level at which National Insurance is paid dropped from £9,100 to £5,000 in April 2025. Even when volunteers step forward to help, energy prices have accelerated rapidly.

Farmers increasingly require full payment in advance, rather than take a deposit and receive the balance after the festival is over. Just as the organisers know too well, farmers are also aware that a festival’s profits – and its capacity to pay all its bills – usually come from the last 20% of tickets sold. An undersold festival can easily run at a loss.

Big event promoters are also taking an increasingly higher share of total ticket sales, and use their financial clout to sign artists to perform exclusively at their events. This restricts the supply of talent available to the smaller and one-off events.

Festivals using crowdfunding

In most cases, though not exclusively, it appears to be smaller festivals using donations and reward-based crowdfunding. The crowdfunding appeals for support tap into the emotions and the positive memories of festivalgoers whose own experiences include building a rapport with strangers over discovering new bands, dancing freely, or embracing spontaneity in an inhibition and judgment-free zone, boosting confidence and creativity.

In 2021 the Marsden Jazz Festival in Yorkshire raised £13,760 from 256 backers, beating its £10,000 target.

In 2024 the not-for-profit annual High Tide Festival in Twickenham reached its target of £15,000 with only a few days to go before the event started, and went on to achieve £16,220.

The Long Division Festival in Wakefield raised almost £5,000 through pre-orders of a book that told the festival’s history from 2011 to 2023.

The Rock Oyster Festival in Cornwall, located on a bank of the River Camel estuary (main image), is a family-friendly food and music camping festival. In 2023 it offered festivalgoers (and anyone else) an opportunity to become a shareholder and invest in equity. It had already secured £250,000, and went on to raise over £315,000 from a total of 115 backers. The 2025 festival took place from July 24 to 27. Festivalgoers dived into over sixty activities – from paddleboarding and surfing lessons in nearby bays to yoga and mindfulness sessions overlooking the estuary.

Other music industry users of crowdfunding

Radio stations

Crowdfunding users range from community-based stations, such as the OFCOM-licensed youth-led radio station Reprezent Radio broadcasting from a shipping container in Brixton, to the national digital station Fix Radio with a playlist tailored for building and construction industry tradespeople.

Early in 2024, Reprezent Radio asked for donations to resolve a cashflow crisis while its registration as a charity was delayed. 375 backers contributed almost £65,000.

Fix Radio eventually raised £950,234 in 2022 from 347 new investors through a successful round of equity crowdfunding that was 26% over-subscribed. The station is going from strength to strength, with higher audience figures attracting the support of advertisers and programme sponsors including building material suppliers such as Wickes, and commercial vehicle makers such as Citroen.

Music industry mentoring

Helping young artists get a toehold in the industry can be invaluable support. In 2024, the MusicGurus.com platform, which aims to be a “Netflix for learning music,” closed its equity crowdfunding campaign after beating its £150,000 target. It is also backed by business angels including the founder of Caffè Nero, Gerry Ford.

Grounded Sounds is a South London-based music organisation and charity providing 15-to-26 year olds with free music workshops, mentoring and career pathways into the music industry. In August 2025 it began a round of donations crowdfunding, with a target to raise £25,000 to plug gaps created by cuts to other funding sources.

Music venues and their staff

The 2023 annual report from the grassroots charity Music Venue Trust showed London’s grassroots music venues were in crisis. Mounting post-Covid debts, whinging neighbours and speculative property developers are all part of the problem, the Evening Standard reported. 125 venues were forced to close down in 2023. Crowdfunding can be used in several ways to help ease financial pressures.

A new restaurant and music venue in Islington broke global fundraising records on Kickstarter in 2023. The campaign generated £248,000 in eight weeks from supporters, which at the time was the largest sum for any restaurant anywhere in the world on the crowdfunding platform. Soul Mama opened in the autumn that year, and continues to serve food from the Caribbean, Africa and South America accompanied by jazz, soul, reggae and gospel music.

Also in 2023, the trade union Unite Hospitality launched a crowdfunding appeal to help staff facing redundancy with just one week’s pay after the sudden closure of a Glasgow music venue bar, the 13th Note. The venue owner claimed it was union activity and staff walkouts over pay and safety concerns that had led to the insolvency.

In 2024, a crowdfunding appeal to raise £35,000 and pay off rent arrears for the grassroots community space Matchstick Piehouse in Deptford failed to reach its target. Money was returned to the donors, and a new £35,000 project began to convert the venue to a workers’ co-op.

Staff lost their jobs when grassroots music venue The Moon closed in Cardiff. With the approval of the musicians concerned, a resident recording engineer compiled a 10-track album from his gig tapes, and £8,766 from sales via reward-based crowdfunding in December 2024 went to the former employees.

Part of the vinyl revival

In 2024, the Scottish startup vinyl record pressing plant Rockvinyl was crowdfunding to buy and install three new presses. It also planned to launch a crowdfunding platform for artists to release new music without personal financial risk through “fan-funded-vinyl.” Its £1.75 million target was perhaps over ambitious, and its website is no longer available.

In January 2025, a 19 year-old former student in Brighton launched a crowdfunding campaign aimed at people who want to support grassroots music. She hoped to raise £6,000 to release her debut three track Indie Pop E.P. 65 backers pledged £6,145 to make her Kickstarter project a reality.

Musical instrument retailers

In June 2025, Hobgoblin Music, the UK’s best-known family-run musical instrument chain, offered 9.5% equity for £190,000 through equity crowdfunding. Customers can get personal expert advice and help from the active musicians who work in their nine shops. The crowdfunding raised £50,881 from 115 backers. There were also investor perks of branded merchandise and discount vouchers that could be collected from stores.

Crowdfunding to block a festival happening

Some residents close to Brockwell Park in south London campaigned in 2025 against an annual music festival going ahead. Their main cause for complaint was the length of time required beyond the festival itself that made parts of the park inaccessible to the public. This included stage construction beforehand, and sewing new grass afterwards.

The anti-festival campaigners crowdfunded over £30,000 to meet legal costs of taking Lambeth Council to court for authorising the event without applying to itself for planning permission to restrict access to parts of the park for more than 28 days. However, the council’s subsequent appeal was upheld. Campaigners are already raising more funds to try and prevent the 2026 festival taking place.

Key takeaways

Some projects for crowdfunding festivals, and other aspects of the music industry fail, though many succeed. Some appear to start slowly without the benefit of any pre-selling so that the crowdfunding begins with a bang and not a whimper.

The wide range of music industry-related projects shows the flexibility of crowdfunding to help any type of organisation raise not only funds but also its profile while forging network of followers and supporters.

What’s Behind an Equity Crowdfunding Slump?

Posted on by Clive Reffell

It was a great pleasure to spend time last week at the EU Startups Summit in Malta. One particularly worthwhile session was a panel discussion on Equity Crowdfunding Dos and Don’ts. A panel of international experts began with a runthrough of the added benefits equity crowdfunding delivers beyond raising funds for early stage businesses to accelerate their growth. Their positivity clashed with a report on the current equity crowdfunding slump I came across on my return home.

Panellists, left to right: Mindaugas Valiulis – Policy Officer, European Commission; Grégoire Touazi – Legal Counsel, Crowdcube Europe; Nora Szeles – CEO, Tőkeportál; Christopher Burge – Co-Founder & CEO, Spark Crowdfunding; Oliver Gajda – Executive Director, Eurocrowd.

Their combined summery of added benefits included:

  1. Successful crowdfunding shows that a business (not necessarily only startups) has the support of a crowd of believers.
  2. A successful round provides social proof of a business worth backing
  3. A crowdfunding investment round can act as a catalyst to unite a community behind a business opportunity, and give them a sense of identity and stronger belief.
  4. Successful crowdfunding is good marketing – it gets a business noticed and talked about.
  5. The best retail investors will support their investments with positive word-of-mouth as they progress up the brand loyalty ladder, becoming advocates and brand ambassadors, and may also become important customers as well.
  6. Crowdfunding enables backers to meet business founders, which can lead to an exchange of introductions, and offers of insight, expertise and assistance.
  7. Each subsequent round can build on the previous one(s), as investors scale up their investments over time.
  8. Future raises have potential as private rounds, carried out exclusively among existing shareholders.

However, my return to the UK coincided with Bloomberg UK publishing an article on the current downturn in equity crowdfunding. The author wrote: “Weaker investor appetite, tough economic headwinds and a patchy success rate are making the [equity crowdfunding] model a tougher sell for both businesses and buyers.”

Data compiled by Beauhurst shows the degree of the downturn.

It got me thinking that when equity began in the UK in around 2012, there was a very low interest rate and there was very low inflation. Net Present Value calculations were hardly required when considering potential returns on investments.

Then in swift succession there was Brexit, Covid (with ‘quantitative easing’ = printing money), the follow-on global reassessment of startup values, a return of inflation, and now Trump’s deliberate destabilisation of global trading.

Aside from these global macro factors, there has been unsettling news within equity crowdfunding itself. This includes cases of businesses that had been funded through crowdfunding going in to administration, and then being bought back by the original founder who was then debt-free. Though the investments of the crowdfunding backers were wiped out and worthless. It’s difficult for investors and interested onlookers to see how this is fair. Thank you East London Liquor Company, among others. Or as they explain it, the blame should fall on HMRC for forcing the business into administration.

The UK Crowdfunding Association – formed to advance the crowdfunding and alternative finance industry – has been publicly silent, while some newspaper reader comments I came across showed the mood of disgruntled investors who responded to such reports with negativity and accusations of behaviour bordering criminality.

While platforms continue to consolidate, Eurocrowd recently commented that the ECSP Regulations intended to harmonise equity crowdfunding across the EU have failed to bring about an anticipated increase in the popularity and use made of equity crowdfunding.

Update

After originally publishing this article in April 2025, I later raised the matter on X/Twitter. My comment was picked up by Crowdfund Insider, who then published their own article on the topic in November 2025. Their answer, in summary, was: “It is a combination of factors, including questions about deal quality, risk aversion, and economic hurdles for smaller investors—such as rising taxes.”

There is also the growing level of rival opportunities for retail investors. The value of gold has risen by over 50% in the 12 months to 4 December 2025, and Bitcoin has provided investors with its usual rollercoaster of ups and downs. Casks of aged whisky and investments in works of art by up-and-coming artists are among the alternative options increasingly available today.

Is it any wonder there’s been a downturn and an equity crowdfunding slump? And where is there a voice that is championing crowdfunding as an effective means of delivering numerous other benefits on top of raising investment funds for privately-owned businesses?

Maximising ROI from BOLD Award Entries

Posted on by Clive Reffell
Three impressive award winners from BOLD Awards 2025

The gala dinner BOLD Awards VI ceremony for category finalists was held this year in Lisbon, Portugal. Among the winners, three particularly stood out to me as a lesson on how to maximise the return on time and cost of entering and attending awards programmes. Winning awards is great marketing!

BILI Social (which stands for Because I Love It) is a Canadian marketing agency that has created a marketplace where brand owners can identify and contact influencers who have a genuine affinity with their brand. BILI’s co-founder and CEO Adrian Capobianco collected the Boldest Marketplace award for himself, and picked up another two for BILI clients! They were Giuseppe Pizza which won Boldest CPG Brand (Consumer Packaged Goods), and Finish: The Torture Test Challenge for Boldest Sustainability. What could better show the benefits they provide to their clients?

…and dos Santos is a business transformation agency based in Berlin. They entered their client Deutsche Bahn, the German state rail operator, and won the BOLD Awards Boldest Future of Work category in 2023. The logo for this achievement sits proudly on their website. This year, the two founding partners Jutta dos Santos Miquelino and Ricardo dos Santos Miquelino entered their Collective Intelligence Design programme that supports client transformation through embracing collaboration and AI-enabled solutions. It won the Boldest Crowdsourcing category.

The third one that really stood out for me was three category winner FundamentalVR. This medtech startup founded by Chris Scattergood has created a surgical equivalent of a flight simulator, which allows surgeons to both advance their skills and rehearse delicate or intricate procedures. They submitted three separate entries and won three categories:
Boldest AI, for FundamentalVR itself in improving surgical performance:
Boldest AR/VR, for its work with the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) to try and prevent childhood blindness through VR simulation;
Boldest Healthtech, for its collaboration with Philips to deliver economical and scalable VR training solutions.

These three very impressive service providers in their various fields of business have each worked out how to win awards on a global stage, impress their clients and collaborative partners, and bring themselves to the attention of new ones.
I’m pretty sure their strategies for success are transferable to other awards programmes – but you heard them first here.

Congratulations to all the winners, and to the other finalists and category judges who made it to Lisbon. The full list of BOLD Awards VI winners is available at https://bold-awards.com/bold-awards-vi-winners/

A Round-up of Crowdfunding Campaigns & News in February 2025

Posted on by Clive Reffell
Main image for a blog by Clive Reffell, independent crowdfunding adviser

This round-up shows the flexibility of crowdfunding for a wide range of users. They include organisations that were asking for donations, selling equity, and encouraging people to invest in community shares.

First, did you know women-led crowdfunding projects outperform men’s by success rate in achieving funding, with 20% shorter campaign completion times.

Equity Crowdfunding

Established in 2009, the made-to-order and sustainable fashion brand Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing (WISC) closed its equity crowdfunding campaign after beating its £150,000 target by 7%. The money will be used for marketing costs and new machinery.

The Smart Container Company is offering equity through crowdfunding to raise funds and accelerate the development of its smart beer kegs. IoT blockchain technology enables tracking their location and checking the temperature the contents is stored at. By February 28 the company had raised 112% of its £150,000 target with 22 days left to tun. EIS benefits (Enterprise Investment Scheme) are available for investors who are UK taxpayers.

JNCK Bakery offers low-sugar, nutritionally enhanced cookies, and recently launched in 550-plus stores across the UK. In February the fmcg startup closed an equity crowdfunding round after raising more than £260,000 to further accelerate growth.

Equity crowdfunding by Reality Games raised £1.56m to further develop an immersive geolocation and augmented reality version of the classic Monopoly board game. Players can explore their own city, trade virtual properties, and compete in global challenges.

UK healthtech startup MultiplAI Health is developing an AI and RNA-based screening test to detect earliest stage cardiovascular and complex diseases. By February 28, with 8 days left to run, MultiplAI Health had reached 71% of its £300,000 target to accelerate commercialising as a lab-developed test in the U.S. market.

Vegan fashion startup Immaculate Vegan, founded in 2019, raised £183,375 through equity crowdfunding from 114 investors. Its target was £150,000 to expand its women’s offering, build newer men’s, home, kids, beauty and pets categories, plus accelerate US customer growth.

A new night train service called “European Sleeper” has crowdfunded for a number of years and in total has raised over €5.5m from over 4,000 backers. The Sunday Times reported on one of its pilot journeys from Brussels to Venice, complete with passengers sleeping in refurbished carriages that are 50 or more year old.

Not at all such good news for investors in Gunna Drinks. The Grocer reported that the collapse of the premium soft drinks brand had left crowdfunding investors particularly angry. They hadn’t even been told the founder and CEO had stepped down last November. “Why are we always the last to know?” complained one exasperated backer.

On a happier note, two guys in Salford who have been friends since school launched The Salford Rum Company in 2018 with £5,000 of savings. Their premium rum rivals luxury gins, and they quickly raised over £314,000 from a round of equity crowdfunding. This has already beaten their £250,000 target and as from February 28 there’s still 26 days left to invest.

P2P Lending Through Bonds

British luxury home decor, wallpaper and lifestyle company, the B-Corp House of Hackney, is crowdfunding to raise £2 million by issuing fixed-interest bonds through Triodos Bank UK. It wants to buy out existing private equity shareholders and pursue its ESG commitments with more vigour. By February 28 it had raised just over £308,000 with 28 days left to run. Looks like it’s going to be a tough call. 

Donations and Rewards Crowdfunding

Bramley Baths is an Edwardian heritage treasure in Leeds, and its fundraisers gave themselves until the end of February to raise the final balance of its community shares crowdfunding target of £350,000 to repair and restore the roof, while also installing new energy-saving features. By the time the crowdfunding project closed at 5pm on February 28 it had raised £374,360 from 531 investors in 140 days.

Community shares are an opportunity for people to champion a local organisation or community asset through financial investment. Community shares are unique to co-operatives and community benefit societies, and they can’t be sold to anyone else. Also, no matter how many shares anyone buys, each shareholder gets just one vote when it comes to making decisions.

A group of anaesthetists (doctors trained in anaesthesia) claim the General Medical Council has blurred the distinction between Doctors and Associates. They are crowdfunding to afford legal action against the GMC. It had raised £176,927 by February 28, and was scheduled to run for a further 30 days.  

Aptitude Health & Fitness, a gym in Cheshire that launched during Covid, has gained permission to triple its size in new premises. In February the founder launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise £30,000 to meet some of the costs and also strengthen user loyalty. By February 28 he had raised over £17,600 with 16 days remaining.

The owners of Devon-based Sharpham Cheese, Greg and Nicky Parsons, hope their round of reward-based crowdfunding will raise £65,000 to enable them to invest in renewable energy, water recycling and new cheese making equipment.

Coming soon

In April I’ll be covering the EU-Startups Summit in Malta for Crowdsourcing Week and BOLD Awards. Two days of networking, inspiration, and learning includes 15 selected startups pitching to a panel of VCs and angel investors for funding. Find out more at https://eu-startups.com/summit/

In the meantime, if you have ideas and plans for using crowdfunding that you’d like to discuss with an impartial and independent crowdfunding adviser, please get in touch by email to [email protected].

BOLD Awards 2025 Crowdfunding Finalists

Posted on by Clive Reffell
Composite image for Clive Reffell blog on BOLD Awards crowdfunding finalists 2025

The public round of voting in the global BOLD Awards for digital industries has closed. The next stage was an assessment by a judge from an international panel, and there are six finalists in the 2025 Boldest Crowdfunding Project category. They will all be invited to attend the gala dinner award ceremony in Lisbon on Friday March 28th, 2025. Crowdfunding is one of 33 categories of digital industries and the tech that powers them, and all category winners will be announced at the event.

Beyond successfully hitting their monetary target, BOLD Awards judges were looking for projects that were particularly effective in promoting their round of crowdfunding, and projects that derived other important benefits beyond raising funds.

Here is a rundown on the six finalists, and you can use the links to check out their BOLD Awards’ entry in full.

Body Rocket

Body Rocket provides bicycle add-ons for serious performance cyclists, including triathletes, to improve the aerodynamics of not only their bike set-up but also their body position. Pre-order sales on Kickstarter provided public validation of their products, and a round of equity crowdfunding enabled customers and other retail investors to be part of the business and enjoy the ride!

Check their full entry at https://bold-awards.com/project/body-rocket/

Pashley Cycles

This Midlands-based bike maker is almost 100 years old, confirming that equity crowdfunding is not just for startups. Their crowdfunding project in 2023 accelerated development of a range of e-cargo bikes for last-mile delivery purposes, and e-bikes appropriate for public hire schemes. Their agreements with regional transport authorities, and an innovative tie-in with a large-scale residential property developer, ensured a ready market for their products. Their growing D2C sales cleverly involved introducing new owners to their dealers around the country for servicing and accessories.

See what you may learn from their full entry at https://bold-awards.com/project/pashley-cycles-crowdfunding-accelerated-development-of-e-bikes/

Neurita Tequila

Neurita is a range of fruit flavoured tequilas, at 35% ABV, designed to appeal more to female drinkers. A concerted effort by the startup founder enabled the brand to quickly win numerous plaudits and medals at international drinks trade shows. This product validation helped encourage investors to back her round of equity crowdfunding. Equally, the crowdfunding success will act as a marketing springboard to open the door to new distribution deals. Good crowdfunding is good marketing!

The full entry is at https://bold-awards.com/project/neurita-tequila/

IzyCoffee

This chain of sustainable coffee shops based in Belgium began trading just four years ago from a single vintage truck. It now has 22 ‘bricks and mortar’ outlets, and the funds generated by a round of equity crowdfunding in 2024 will accelerate opening outlets in major cities throughout the EU. Any customer had an opportunity to become a shareholder.

The crowdfunding also recruited a cohort of highly brand loyal supporters. Backers who invested higher amounts were able to become accredited Brand Ambassadors. They will provide valuable word-of-mouth support about IzyCoffee’s sustainability priorities and behaviours in the locations of both the existing stores and where a new store will open in the next couple of years.

Their entry is at  https://bold-awards.com/project/izycoffee-a-chain-of-coffee-shops/#main-menu

Prime Time

Prime Time brews award-winning, low-calorie beer in the UK. The two founders shared a passion for great tasting beer and good times. Their commitment to staying fit and leading a balanced lifestyle also led them to brewing beers that have 30% fewer calories, 63% fewer carbs, are gluten free and suitable for vegans.

Publicising their crowdfunding in 2024 was helped by having gained over 10,000 Instagram followers. A presence at festivals and other events also built brand exposure among sociable early adopters and provided opportunities to sign up new followers.

Added incentives to invest included a 20% discount off their website prices for every investor backing them to the tune of £100 or more, rising to 40% for £5,000 or more.

Prime Time’s full BOLD Awards entry as it https://bold-awards.com/project/prime-time/

ConnectionPoint

This Canadian entry is rather different from the others. This B-Corp business has launched four crowdfunding platforms that make a positive social impact.

  • FundRazr is a digital fundraising platform for non-profits, social causes and professional fundraisers.
  • Crowdfundr is a platform designed for creators to sustainably fund their projects and ideas. 
  • Cocopay enables friends and family to pay for a patient’s medical costs and quality healthcare.
  • PetFundr is a crowdfunding platform for animal and pet care for rescues, veterinarians and “pet parents.”

They also provide the backbone technology for organisations to power their own crowdfunding project with an entire advanced fundraising suite.

The ConnectionPoint entry is at https://bold-awards.com/project/connectionpoint/

Crowdfunding is diverse and flexible

Between them, these BOLD Awards crowdfunding category finalists display the diversity and versatility of crowdfunding to be applied to worthy public causes, personal needs, pre-orders to support the development of new products, and equity investment in privately-owned businesses, whether they are startups or well established businesses.

There are also several ways a crowdfunding project can be promoted to improve the likelihood of success. On top of developing innovative products and services, they include gaining industry awards; building large social media followings; achieving sales success and satisfied customers; and having lucrative corporate contracts.

Non-finalists can request a VIP Invitation to attend the BOLD Awards gala dinner award ceremony in Lisbon. It’s a unique event for networking with inspiring global innovators, disruptors and entrepreneurs on Friday 28th March. Hope to see you there!

To discuss your own ideas and plans for a crowdfunding project with an independent UK crowdfunding adviser, who is not tied to any specific platforms, start by emailing me at [email protected]. Go on, #beBOLD

Entry Deadline for Boldest Crowdfunding Award Closes January 9

Posted on by Clive Reffell
Main mage for a blog about Boldest Crowdfunding Award

I have been writing about crowdfunding for Crowdsourcing Week since 2016, and Crowdsourcing Week is a co-founder of the international BOLD Awards for innovators and innovation. There’s an amazing 33 categories of digital industries and the tech that powers them, including crowdfunding. Crowdfunding award schemes seem to be pretty few and far between, and here’s a bit more of an explanation about this one and the benefits of entering before the deadline of January 9.

Why bother?

  • Entering awards shows you think your team is doing a great job, and win or lose it can boost team morale.
  • To enter awards shows confidence to existing customers and stakeholders, and it can be a door-opener to new ones.
  • The process of creating an entry identifies what a company is doing particularly well, and can become transferable content used for other valuable purposes.
  • Progression through stages of the BOLD Awards provides a stream of marketing content to use in any way you decide.

What does it take to enter?

A written submission of just a few hundred words, with links possible to other content, should start with an overview of what your organisation is and does. This probably already exists. And then cover these three points:

  1. A summary of your successful crowdfunding campaign
  2. Demonstrate how you encouraged people to back your project
  3. Describe a benefit, or benefits, the crowdfunding delivered beyond simply raising money.
  • Once an online entry is started, it can be re-visited and worked on right up to the final deadline on January 9, 2025.
  • Take a look at 2024’s finalists.

The BOLD Awards structure

  • There are 33 categories of digital industries and the tech that powers them.
  • Boldest Crowdfunding Project is one of the categories. It’s not all about who raised the most money, and it’s not just for startups.
  • Each entry can be submitted in up to three categories, so each business that enters can choose the most appropriate other ones. It could be Boldest Sustainability if you’re helping the planet, Boldest CPG if you produce consumer packaged goods, Boldest Mobility if you’re in the transport sector, and so on.
  • The entry deadline date is January 9, 2025, so there’s not much time.

What it takes to win

  • Submit an entry to begin with.
  • A round of public voting in January is an opportunity for a business to mobilise its customers, investors, social media followers, and other stakeholders. It will let them know you’re confident to enter, and it can boost brand loyalty when people feel flattered that they are asked for their personal support.
  • A short list of the top entries will go to the next stage of assessment by a panel of international judges.
  • The winner in each category will be determined by a 50/50 blend of public votes and judge’s score.

Award ceremony

  • Finalists in all categories will be invited to attend a gala dinner award ceremony in Lisbon, Portugal, on Friday March 28th, 2025.
  • This is a unique event to network with peers among some of the world’s most innovative talent, and with representatives of the various category partners/sponsors.
  • Use event photos in your internal communications and external marketing.

What else?

  • Please get in touch via [email protected] if you have anything you want to ask or check.

I wish you a successful 2025, and hope you close Quarter 1 by receiving a BOLD Award in Lisbon. It would be great to see you there. #beBOLD