General advice about funding

There are many small and large sources of funding across the UK.

But first you need to know exactly what you want to do. Many funders will only work with certain projects, like the arts, or young people, and so on.

You also need to know how much money you are asking for. Funders often have restrictions on how much they’ll give.

You’ll need to have a bank account for the group. You won’t always need to be a charity. Groundwork has some excellent and simple advice about applying for funding. We also have our own advice in a separate document.

To find out about specific funding from your local council, in England and Wales, use the government’s funding finder. Click this link and put your postcode in the box. It will take you to the right page on your local council’s website.

Sign up for the free account at My Funding Central. They’ll email you regularly with funding news.

The website Community Foundations covers most of the UK. Put your postcode in, and it’ll find your nearest Community Foundation. These are groups which help small organisations to find money.

The UK Democracy Network offers an open directory of funding and grants supporting a better and healthier democracy in the United Kingdom. The database covers areas including environmental causes, community organising, heritage and voluntary groups.

Co-operatives UK has an accessible Finance Guide for directors, trustees and staff of a co-operative, community benefit or charitable community benefit society.

A co-op is a business or organisation that’s owned and controlled by its members who all have a say in how the co-op is run. Learn more about co-ops.

Lists of funders

If you prefer to look at a book, you can use The Directory of Grant Making Trusts. It’s published every year by The Directory of Social Change, and it’ll usually be in your local library.

Grants Online lists new grants available across the UK. The list updates every day.

GrantFinder also lists fundinwhog across the UK. That link goes to their community development grants, but also look at other sections. These might be:

• Arts, Culture and Heritage Funding.
• Environmental Grants, Grants for Children.
• Young People and Families.
• …and maybe some of the others, depending on how specialist your project is.

Charity Excellence has a free Funder Finding Database.

Here is the National Lottery Community Fund.

This is some specifically Scottish funding.

Other sources of money

It’s unlikely you’ll be looking for investment rather than a grant. But if you do want to borrow money, look here.

You might do some fundraising activities. Look at our separate document about running fundraising events.

Other help

NCVO has a free spreadsheet tool to help you plan your budget. This can be useful when you’re applying for grants!