New businesses in Kent — October 2026
Auspector ·
Between September 27 and October 27, 2026, 877 business records in Kent entered our newly opened businesses section — sixth among the UK’s 150 counties. Dartford received the most of any Kent town (61), ahead of Ashford (54) and Maidstone (53), Kent’s largest town in our database.
How many new businesses open in Kent?
Between September 27 and October 27, 2026, 877 Kent records entered our newly opened businesses section — about 29 a day, from 104,357 records in our database — which puts Kent sixth among the UK’s 150 counties by new records.
Medway — Chatham, Gillingham, Rochester and Strood — is a unitary authority with a page of its own and is not in the Kent figures; it received 122 new records in the same window.
Which Kent towns get the most new businesses?
| Town | New records | All records | New per 1,000 records | Phone | Website information |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dartford | 61 | 4,804 | 12.7 | 76.8% | 67.7% |
| Ashford | 54 | 4,857 | 11.1 | 77.5% | 67.1% |
| Maidstone | 53 | 7,517 | 7.1 | 77.0% | 64.1% |
| Royal Tunbridge Wells | 50 | 4,944 | 10.1 | 82.7% | 70.3% |
| Gravesend | 42 | 3,214 | 13.1 | 78.6% | 61.0% |
| Canterbury | 37 | 5,556 | 6.7 | 64.6% | 67.4% |
| Sevenoaks | 33 | 2,690 | 12.3 | 83.5% | 70.9% |
| Sittingbourne | 28 | 3,298 | 8.5 | 80.7% | 63.6% |
| Ramsgate | 24 | 3,010 | 8.0 | 72.4% | 60.8% |
| Margate | 22 | 3,400 | 6.5 | 62.6% | 59.9% |
| Folkestone | 21 | 3,503 | 6.0 | 73.1% | 63.6% |
| Tonbridge | 19 | 2,898 | 6.6 | 81.8% | 66.1% |
| Whitstable | 16 | 2,703 | 5.9 | 64.0% | 64.7% |
| Herne Bay | 11 | 2,267 | 4.9 | 74.9% | 58.9% |
| Broadstairs | 11 | 2,232 | 4.9 | 63.0% | 64.3% |
Dartford leads with 61, although Maidstone has the most records of any Kent town (7,517) and received 53 — 7.1 per 1,000 against 12.7. The highest rate in the table is Gravesend (13.1), the lowest Broadstairs (4.9) and Herne Bay (4.9).
The difference runs across the county. Dartford and Gravesend, on the Thames in north-west Kent, received 103 new records from 8,018 records (12.8 per 1,000). The six coastal towns in the table — Margate, Ramsgate, Broadstairs, Folkestone, Whitstable and Herne Bay — received 105 from 17,115 (6.1). Phone numbers are also less common on coastal records: 68.4% of all records in those towns list one, against 77.6% in Dartford and Gravesend.
Which sectors are opening?
| Sector | New records | All records | New per 1,000 records |
|---|---|---|---|
| Construction companies | 44 | 2,638 | 16.7 |
| Hair and beauty salons | 39 | 3,231 | 12.1 |
| Auto repair shops | 23 | 1,349 | 17.0 |
| Cafés | 19 | 1,197 | 15.9 |
| Restaurants | 17 | 2,182 | 7.8 |
| Gyms and fitness studios | 14 | 606 | 23.1 |
| Supermarkets and grocery stores | 11 | 1,401 | 7.9 |
| Bars and pubs | 6 | 994 | 6.0 |
| Clothing stores | 6 | 543 | 11.0 |
| Real estate agencies | <5 | 625 | — |
| Dentists and dental clinics | <5 | 490 | — |
| Car dealers | <5 | 419 | — |
| Bakeries and pastry shops | <5 | 351 | — |
| Pharmacies | <5 | 288 | — |
Construction companies lead with 44, ahead of hair and beauty salons (39) — Kent is the only one of the six counties in this series where construction is the largest sector by new records. Cafés (19) outnumber restaurants (17). Among sectors with 15 or more new records, auto repair shops (17.0) and construction companies (16.7) have the highest rates per 1,000; both include businesses that serve customers across an area and can have more than one record. Gyms and fitness studios had 14 new records from 606 — a high rate (23.1) on small numbers.
Kent and its neighbours
| County | New records | All records | New per 1,000 records | Rank by new records (of 150) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kent | 877 | 104,357 | 8.4 | 6 |
| Surrey | 860 | 76,006 | 11.3 | 7 |
| East Sussex | 308 | 40,456 | 7.6 | 29 |
| Medway | 122 | 13,905 | 8.8 | 65 |
Surrey has 27% fewer records than Kent in our database but received almost as many new ones (860 to 877) — 11.3 per 1,000 against 8.4. East Sussex (7.6) and Medway (8.8) are the other two. Greater London borders Kent as well — new businesses in London — and Essex lies across the Thames estuary: new businesses in Essex.
What it means if you sell to new businesses in Kent
- Builders’ merchants, plant hire, trade insurance. 44 new construction records, about 10 a week. Group by phone number before you count businesses. More on the sector: new construction companies.
- West Kent as one territory. Dartford, Gravesend and Sevenoaks together received 136 new records, about 32 a week.
- The coast needs a second channel. With fewer phone numbers on coastal records, a call list from Margate and Ramsgate is shorter per hundred records; the website on a record is the other way in.
- Cafés and gyms. 19 new cafés and 14 new gyms and fitness studios: new coffee shops and cafés and new gyms and fitness studios.
How to pull a list for Kent
- Location: United Kingdom, the county Kent, then a town such as Dartford or Ashford — the same address locality as in the table.
- Section and filters: newly opened businesses (the last 30 days, updated daily), then a sector or a narrower category. Categories are each record’s own, so “barber shop” or “tyre shop” can be a list of its own. Phone — has, for a call list; Website — none, for web design prospects.
- Count, then open: searching and counting are free on every plan; a credit is spent only when you first open a record, and a CSV or XLSX export counts as an open (pricing). Save the search and new matches arrive by email every day.