"The consuming city: women and their businesses in late Victorian Glasgow"

In this paper we offer new quantitative perspectives on the economic contribution of women's businesses and their importance to a rapidly urbanising population. Combining information from entries in trade directories with named business owners in the annual assessment of property rental values, we build a detailed picture of the extent of women’s entrepreneurship in Glasgow, the location of that business activity, and the distance between a women’s business and their place of residence.
Between 1861 and 1881, our analysis of rental assessments shows nearly a doubling in the number of commercial premises occupied by women in Glasgow (1,700, to 3,000). This is not reflected in the trade directory listings where we only see an increase from 1,300 to 1,600 listings. Most of the business activity was focused in sectors traditionally associated with women in business during this era (i.e., food, clothing, and teaching), and women business owners consistently paid lower rents than men. However, in some common sectors (alcoholic drinks, furnishings, milk selling), men and women appear to have operated businesses of comparable size, as the rent gap between genders is modest. By rental value the most substantial women-owned businesses were theatres and hotels.
Using business addresses from the trade directories and valuation rolls we explore whether women owned businesses were clustered, more likely to be found in certain parts of the city, and the distance between their business and residence. Our preliminary results indicate that women’s businesses populate the city in different ways; women located their businesses closer to their place of residence (or at their place of residence) when compared to their male counterparts. And, by linking Census data to the above information, we explore how factors such as marital status, age, and household influence business distance from residence, and find evidence that family structure influenced this relationship.