A community for small business owners across West Oxfordshire and the Cotswolds who want to grow, connect, and remember what it feels like to not do everything alone.

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48,887
Registered businesses across Oxfordshire, a record high
Inform Direct / Companies House 2024
1 in 2
Small business owners say they have experienced loneliness running their company
YouGov / British Business Bank 2024
56%
Of microbusiness owners feel isolated, far higher than in larger firms
Start Up Loans / British Business Bank

What we do

You had a brilliant idea. Now you need people.

When you left the workforce and went out on your own, you left behind something you probably did not expect to miss: the everyday rhythm of having people around. The corridor conversations, the sanity checks, the shared lunches. Build and Belong exists to give that back.

We bring together small business owners across West Oxfordshire and the Cotswolds for events, workshops, coffees, and wellbeing experiences that are genuinely worth showing up to.

Belong Socials

Belong Socials

Relaxed, informal gatherings where you can meet other business owners, share stories, and leave feeling less alone in it all.

Build Coffees

Build Coffees

Small group mornings built around real conversation. Bring a challenge, leave with perspective and possibly a new collaborator.

Build Workshops

Build Workshops

Practical sessions on the things nobody teaches you when you go self-employed. Finance, marketing, operations, led by people who actually know.

Belong Health

Belong Health

Wellbeing breaks and experiences that remind you there is a person behind the business. Because burnout is not a business strategy.

Why wellbeing matters

The loneliness of small business ownership is real.

When you step out of an employed workforce, you lose the informal support structures that most people take entirely for granted. There is nobody to sense check with. Nobody who gets it. And the longer you go without that, the harder the work becomes.

"Building a business is hard. Doing it alone is harder."

Build & Belong
01
Connection changes outcomes

Business owners with peer networks make better decisions, recover faster from setbacks, and report higher satisfaction.

02
Stepping away builds capacity

The pause is not the distraction. Wellbeing breaks create the headspace that makes the hard problems easier to solve.

03
Community is infrastructure

Knowing who to call, who has been there, who has the answer: that network is one of the most valuable assets a small business can have.

Ready to join?

Become part of the community.

Join the growing community of small business owners across West Oxfordshire and the Cotswolds. People who get it, in your corner.

Become a Member

What is on

Events

Gatherings, workshops, and experiences worth putting in the diary. Tickets are limited, so grab yours early.

Coming up

Upcoming Events

Look back

Past Events

►

Belong Social, The Highway, Burford

Our first gathering brought 15 of us together at The Highway in Burford for an evening of easy conversation and connection. The start of something we cannot wait to grow.

Join us

Membership

Become part of a community of small business owners who understand exactly what you are building.

Current tier

Community Member

Your way into the Build and Belong community and everything happening across West Oxfordshire and the Cotswolds.

  • Access to the Build and Belong WhatsApp community
  • Invitations to all Belong Socials events
  • Early access to Build Coffees and Build Workshops
  • Belong Health wellbeing event invitations
  • Listing in the member business directory
Sign Up Now

Become a member

Fill in your details below and you will get your invite to the Build and Belong WhatsApp community straight away.

By joining you agree to receive your WhatsApp community invite and occasional updates from Build and Belong. We will never share your details with third parties.

Our story

About Us

We built the community we wished we had.

M

Melissa

Co-founder

Melissa brings over a decade of experience working across education, school improvement, and SEND. Roles that sit at the heart of understanding people, what they need to thrive, and how community changes everything. She knows first hand that wellbeing is not a luxury. It is the foundation everything else is built on.

When she stepped into the world of independent consultancy, she found what so many small business owners find: the work was fulfilling, but the isolation was real. Build and Belong grew from that gap.

E

Elliott

Co-founder

Elliott is a Fractional CFO who works with growth businesses at the point where great ideas need to become sustainable enterprises. He has sat across the table from dozens of founders who had brilliant products, real passion, and almost no idea how to translate that into profit, not because they were not capable, but because nobody had ever shown them how.

That practical financial expertise is woven into everything Build and Belong does. Because community is important, but so is building something that actually works.

Why we built this

Small business ownership comes with a strange kind of loneliness.

You leave behind the rhythm of a workplace, the colleagues, the informal chats, the shared frustrations, and suddenly you are navigating every decision on your own. There is nobody to sense check with. Nobody who gets it.

We built Build and Belong because that does not have to be the reality. West Oxfordshire and the Cotswolds are full of brilliant, ambitious, independent people doing remarkable things. They just need somewhere to find each other.

Join the Community