Manchester’s creative freelancers are funding their own careers through debt and second jobs, while navigating a financial system which is not built for them, according to new research by Loqbox, a credit-building platform and financial wellbeing business, published ahead of its partnership with Manchester Fashion Week 2026.
Every single creative freelancer working in fashion surveyed in Manchester has seriously considered leaving the industry (100%), with sector instability (39%) and financial pressure (36%) the top two reasons locally. Those who’ve stayed are facing a credit paradox: greater financial discipline isn’t translating into better access to housing or credit.
Manchester Fashion Week 2026 is putting a heavy focus on economic viability, such as through its Tech Day event, helping emerging designers build sustainable businesses and making creative careers more accessible for the next generation. Gemma Gratton, CEO & Executive Producer at Manchester Fashion Week, said: “Manchester Fashion Week is delighted to partner with Loqbox for our Tech Day. We recognise that building a creative career is not just about talent and ambition – navigating the financial realities of starting and growing a business is a significant part of that journey.
“Our Tech Day is focused on the technology, innovation and ideas that can drive meaningful change across the wider fashion industry, and Loqbox brings that same spirit of innovation while speaking directly to the emerging designers and creative talent we are building this platform for. We’re excited to bring those two worlds together.”
Loqbox’s research puts hard data behind that conversation and points to a distinctly local gap too.
Manchester’s most disciplined freelancers, still penalised
Financial pressure is showing up in how Manchester’s freelancers survive day to day: 88% have borrowed just to cover everyday living costs, well above the national average of 70%, and 88% have taken a second or side job, compared to 74% nationally, with 28% using ‘buy now, pay later’ to fund their first collection or equipment. Creative careers here are being subsidised by personal debt and second jobs, rather than grants or investment, and it’s pushing people to leave the industry altogether.
Managing money on that basis takes real discipline: 83% say they’ve become better about paying bills, cards and loans on time since going freelance, above the national average of 72% – yet 79% say their credit score has got worse anyway.
More than a third (38%) have been declined a rental property, effectively locking people out of stable housing due to earning an irregular income. Similarly, 38% have been declined a business loan, and three in ten (30%) a credit card, for the same reason.
On paper, two people may have the same incomes. The only difference is that one is salaried and the other is freelance, and the latter appears to be judged by a different standard. Affordability checks and credit models built for regular income often mark freelancers down, no matter how responsibly they manage their money.
Dani Palmer, Consumer Finance Expert at Loqbox commented on the findings: “These findings are a clear reminder that creative freelancers in Manchester are expected to run a business, price their work, manage irregular income, and understand tax, long before anyone gives them the tools to do it with confidence.
“There’s more that the government and financial institutions can do to make the financial system more accessible for people like them. In the meantime, we’re focused on giving freelancers the confidence to take small, practical steps towards a stronger financial future.”
The financial education gap
In Manchester, 81% say nobody ever taught them how credit works, well above the national average of 74% – they’ve had to figure it out themselves since going freelance. And yet their knowledge runs ahead of the UK average: 93% understand what affects their credit score and 85% know their score or band, compared to 73% and 76% nationally respectively.
It’s a distinctly local story: best-informed, most disciplined, worst outcomes. They’ve taught themselves, and they’re still struggling. Their effort doesn’t translate because the system wasn’t designed for people who earn the way they do.
Kemi Gbadebo, the Manchester-based founder of Gbadebo, a fashion label built on circularity, said: “Nobody tells you how much fashion actually costs to run. I’ve put tens of thousands of my own money into my brand since I started, and looking back, it’s honestly hard to comprehend. There’s no formal education for anything like tax or cost and pricing structures – we’re not taught it at university, so you end up learning the hard way, often after you’ve already been exploited.
On top of that, the system works against you. The routes other creative sectors rely on aren’t really open to us: most arts funding requires an outcome you can’t sell, which rules out a commercial collection. So you self-fund, hoping the trend cycle hasn’t moved on by the time your collection lands. It really is no wonder so many brands don’t make it past the first couple of years.”
What needs to change?
To close that gap, one that Manchester’s freelancers feel more acutely than most, fixing it starts with how income is judged. Lenders and credit reference agencies need to build affordability checks and credit models that reflect how freelancers actually earn, not just ones designed around salaried, predictable income.
Financial education has to reach creatives where they already are, through business support schemes, arts programmes, university courses, and tools that let people build a credit history without taking on debt in the process.
To find out more about Loqbox, visit https://www.loqbox.com/ and for more on its involvement at Manchester Fashion Week, visit https://www.fashionweekmanchester.co.uk/schedule.