New companies in Dorset

Dorset saw 55 new companies incorporated in the week of 19 October to 25 October 2026, 24% below the year-earlier weekly average (adjusted for companies dissolved since). About 23 of them are expected to trade, judging by what happened to similar companies; 27% were registered at a mass-formation or virtual-office address, so 40 were formed at their own address. Rising this week: Hospitality & food, Finance & insurance, Business support. Among companies formed in the last 8 weeks, 56 already have a website verified as theirs and 5 have registered food premises.

Updated 30 October 2026 · covers Monday 19 October to Sunday 25 October 2026 · next update Monday · RSS · JSON

Of this week's 55: 34 operating businesses formed at their own or a home address; 15 at a mass-formation or virtual-office address; 7 property or holding companies; 33 of the 55 checked so far have no website yet.

For accountants, accounts due: 2,776 companies in Dorset have accounts due in the next three months and are not registered at an accountant's address. They've filed trading accounts before, are current on their confirmation statement and are registered at their own address (356 within a month, 402 in one to two, 2,018 in two to three); 98 more are already overdue but not yet in strike-off. The free Monday email names five of them; the accountancy subscription has them with due date and registered office, in a weekly batch of the ones due about twelve weeks out. Register of 2026-10.

For accountants, companies that may be changing accountant: 22 established Dorset companies moved their registered office away from an accountancy firm's address between 2 October 2026 and 30 October 2026, which can mean they've parted with that firm. The accountancy subscription names them each week, on the Something changed sheet. Counted from the office changes filed at Companies House, against the addresses where accountancy firms are registered.

What they do

Primary SIC code of the 55 companies incorporated this week. Rising against the previous 12 weeks: Hospitality & food, Finance & insurance, Business support.

What happens to them

Of the 4,908 companies formed in Dorset between January 2022 and September 2023 at their own address, 52% were still on the register three years later and 37% had filed trading accounts, ranking 232nd of 357 councils (UK: 51% and 35%; South West: 57% and 40%). A further 2,950 were registered at mass-formation or virtual-office addresses (38% of the total) and are left out, because their outcomes say more about the agent than the place (what these addresses are). Most of the rest never traded: they missed their first confirmation statement and were struck off at about seventeen months. The Business Survival Index: every council and constituency compared · how this is measured, why it agrees with the ONS, and why it excludes the roughly 4% of companies whose address the registrar has since removed · CSV.

What's being started here

New companies registered in Dorset in twelve high street trades, 2019 and 2025, counting only addresses with fewer than ten companies of the same trade. Registered office, not trading address. Source: Companies House register, read 10 October 2026.

Dorset ranks 86th of 361 councils for the number of new high street companies in 2025.

Across the UK, the trade codes chosen by new companies rose 36% between 2019 and 2025, partly because founders now pick more codes for each company, so a rise in one trade can simply keep pace with the register. A company can choose up to four trade codes, so one company can appear in two rows and is counted in the total once for each. What Britain starts now has the national figures, the method and the caveats.

Pubs and bars here

Pub and bar sites in Dorset registered for VAT or PAYE, as counted by the Office for National Statistics each March (UK Business Counts, SIC 56302, rounded to 5). In March 2026, 75% of them were run by a company.

Nationally there were 37,350 pub and bar sites in March 2026, down 4.6% from March 2019 and down 16.4% from 2010; the fall has run at the same pace since 2019 as in the six years before, and about one registered pub in five closed for good in each of the last two periods, the same share before and after 2019. The pubs piece has the method, the caveats and every council's figures as CSV.

Business-to-business email to a limited company or LLP is permitted under PECR without prior consent, provided you say who you are and offer an opt-out. Every row says where the address came from. No director names, no home addresses.

Put this week's Dorset numbers on your own website

A small card that updates itself every Monday. Paste the code into any page: a council news page, a firm's "local business" page, a newsletter template. It's free, with attribution to Salenovo and Companies House.

<a href="https://www.salenovo.com/la/dorset/" title="New companies in Dorset this week, from the Salenovo Formation Index"><img src="https://www.salenovo.com/embed/la/dorset.svg" alt="New companies in Dorset this week, from the Salenovo Formation Index" width="320" height="200" loading="lazy"></a>

The companies

Every company incorporated in Dorset in the week of 19 October, from the public register. Which ones will trade, what each one is, whether it already has an accountant, and how to reach it are in the paid list (see a sample week).