What’s cool about GCSE Business Studies is it’s about real business.

The exam board which your school may use can differ, but the syllabus is similar.

Syllabus

For now, we will skip exam techniques, and head straight for the first topic.

Business in the real world

The purpose and nature of businesses

People start businesses for a number of reasons.

These can include:

Noticing a gap in the market, for example, a lack of an electric car serving centre locally.

Fulfil personal ambitions. these might include being in charge and having more flexibility than an employee might have.

Helping people, for example by creating a home help service.

To create a service, such as window cleaning for homeowners and property landlords.

To produce goods, such as shopping trolleys for supermarkets.

Distribution of products to other businesses (known as B2B), or the public (B2C). An example of B2C (Business to Consumer) is Asda and Tesco supermarkets.

Goods and Services definition

Goods are known as Tangible items.

Tangible items are items that you can see and hold.

It is also an item that can be and needs to be stored.

An example of a tangible item (Goods) is an iPad or a spanner.

Services are Intangible items, which cannot be held, seen or stored.

Businesses providing Intangible items include broadband providers, bus journeys and hairdressers.

They are supplying services for a set period of time.

Wants and needs

Wants are products and services that people want but don’t need to survive.

Examples of wants are concert tickets and the latest designer trainers.

If you could live without designer trainers and Ed Sheeran tickets (which you can), then it’s a want.

Needs, on the other hand, are required in order to survive.

Needs are life essentials, such as clothing, shelter (a house or flat), heating, food and water.

Review

We’ve so far learnt some of the reasons why people set up businesses, so next, we look at what is required for a successful business.

Factors of production

There are four factors of production.

A business needs all four to provide a product or service.

The four factors of production are land, labour, capital and enterprise.