Investigating Women-Owned Home-Based Businesses in Scotland: A Content Analysis Approach

Home-based entrepreneurs have recently received significant attention seeing that in the UK, these businesses make up a significant proportion of the small business sector. However, their contribution to economic development has not been fully established as they are perceived to be invisible. In Scotland, there is an ongoing discussion that the proportion of Home-based businesses is slightly higher than in other areas in the UK. Scotland has therefore deemed an appropriate geographical context in which to study Home-Based Businesses (HBBs). There is limited research, especially in the context of women-owned HBBs, which are often associated with hobby businesses or side hustles with short-term life spans, a myth saddled by colonial origins. This work is the first to systematically review home-based businesses in Scotland and throw more light on the potential of this set of entrepreneurs. We adopt a content analysis methodology to query existing literature and studies to identify the current state of the discussion and key areas for future research. Findings reveal three key themes in relation to women home-based HBBs in Scotland to include: motivation, invisibility of this sector and digital technology adoption as discussed in the limited literature and we further propose key aspects for further research. We also identified the following misconceptions around women-owned HBBs such as being seen as non-ambitious lacking prospects and undervalued due to the mode of operation.