Information and Reference Services
Business Information Service
The Business Information Service is here to support local businesses, or to help you if you're starting up in business.
It's based at Solihull Central Library, where it provides a large range of free, key information resources which can help you if you need help with:
- Starting up a business
- Putting together a business plan
- Creating a mailing list
- Company or product information
- Legal or financial information
- British Standards
- Market research
- Import/export
There are also internet-access computers, free to use in every library.
Free internet access to high quality information
Information needed for setting up and running a business can be expensive. That's why we pay to subscribe to a range of key business information products - so you don't have to.
What's more - you can access them free of charge from your own office or home, any time of day or night. All you need is your library card. If you don't have one, you can get that free too from any Solihull library.
Just look at the resources you can access without leaving your desk:
British Standards Online
The authoritative site for all BSI publications. Updated daily, you get free access to full-text British Standards - including over 38,500 current, draft and historic Standards, more than 16,000 of which are BSI-adopted European and International standards.
Link: http://www.solihull.gov.uk/BritishStandard/index.asp
CANS Advice Notes Online
CANS Online explains the law clearly and simply under a full range of helpful sections, including business, tax, company law, employment, road transport, etc.
Link: www.cans.org.uk/index.php?id=144
The Complete Business Reference Adviser
If you're starting up or running a business, COBRA provides information to help with start-up, employment, legal, finance, marketing, exporting, health & safety, as well as many useful links in the Local Area Profile.
Visit the cobra website and enter your library card number.
Link: solihull.cobwebinfo.com
Kompass
Access more 2 million companies worldwide in more than 70 countries. The Advanced Search enables you to search for purchasers or suppliers, using the unique product classification, as well as many other search criteria.
Visit Kompass and enter your library card number.
Link: www.kompass.com/referrer
NewsUK
68 National and local newspapers, from the Daily Telegraph and Guardian to the Sun and Mirror, and the Birmingham Post and Mail, and journals such as the Economist. You can use News Topics or save your search to keep up to date with news related to your area of business, or to find out about a company or product. It has editions going back several years.
Visit the NewsUK website and enter your library card number.
Link: http://www.newsuk.co.uk/
Available at Solihull Central Library itself:
Experian Corporate Researcher
Comprehensive financial and other information on all 1.8 million UK limited companies.
You can:
- Look up the details of a single company
- Select the details of multiple companies and analyse them as a group
- Compare individual and groups of companies
- Generate mailing lists of companies for targeting
The Excel interface allows report lists, tables and graphics to be easily tailored to your individual requirements.
This is a very popular resource, but licensing restrictions mean that it is only available at Solihull Central Library.
Key Note Market Intelligence Service
Over 370 current market research reports and assessments across 27 market sectors. There are 18 new or updated titles every month. You can view summaries of the reports at http://www.keynote.co.uk/ from any PC and see full reports from computers at Solihull Central Library free of charge.
eMoneyfacts
The online service of Moneyfacts journal. It includes market mortgage sourcing, life quotations, savings, loans and cards searches, and statistics such as the Retail Price Index since 1948.
Other resources:
Not everything is online, and there's still a wide range of information resources we can use to help you
- Extensive directories, e.g. Dun & Bradstreet Regional Business Registers, Company Refs, Who Owns Whom, etc.Complete set of UK Phone Books and Yellow Pages
- Sources of Grants and Aid for Business
- UK statistics on economic and social trends
- Detailed local census information
Contact: Gary Archer (0121 704 6921)
E-mail: infols@solihull.gov.uk