Business Expansion Grant: Local Enterprise Office money for growing firms, and who is left out

Who can get it, and who cannot

This is the Local Enterprise Office grant for a business past its first 18 months that wants to grow: new equipment, new staff, a push into new markets. Sole traders, partnerships and limited companies can apply if the business:

• has no more than 10 employees, though an office can make exceptions
• is established, registered and operating in the office's own area
• can show a market for what it sells
• has room to grow at home or abroad, and to create jobs
• is not a client of Enterprise Ireland, IDA Ireland or Údarás na Gaeltachta

The sector rule matters more than any of those. The official eligibility page says the grant aid "does not support" retail, personal services, professional services, or construction and local building services. Priority goes to manufacturing and internationally traded services that can become exporters.

It makes no difference how long a local business has traded or how many people it employs. Cork City lists builders, hairdressers, cafes, pubs, hotels, general printers and trades as businesses it cannot grant-aid, because helping one would put the others at a disadvantage.

If your business is excluded, what it can use instead

An established local business has more options than a new one, because most of these ask for at least six months of trading:

• the Grow Digital Voucher for booking, stock and accounts software, which pays 50% up to €5,000
• the Energy Efficiency Grant for ovens, fridges and controls, which pays 75% up to €10,000
• free time with a digital consultant and a green consultant, and one-to-one mentoring
• a Microfinance Ireland loan of €2,000 to €50,000, for businesses with fewer than 10 staff
• your council's rates incentive for vacant units, if it has one and you are moving premises

What it pays

The national rule is 50% of the investment, up to €150,000. Grants over €80,000 are "the exception", kept for projects that can clearly move on to Enterprise Ireland or export internationally. For everyone else the ceiling is €80,000.

Dublin City and Cork City set their ceiling at €50,000. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown sets it at €80,000.

In 2025 the offices approved 340 Business Expansion Grants worth €10,996,206, which is about €32,000 each.

The costs that count are the same four as for a start-up:

• Salaries. Up to €15,000 towards each new full-time job in its first year. Jobs paying over €40,000 get the full amount and lower-paid jobs get less.
• Capital items. Machinery, equipment, fit-out and fixed technology.
• Consultancy, innovation and marketing.
• General overheads.

Buildings, land, vehicles, laptops and phones are not covered, and neither is VAT. Nothing you ordered or paid for before applying counts.

A grant of €50,000 or more, or one that brings your total to €100,000 over three years, needs Enterprise Ireland's approval as well.

If you already had a Priming Grant

You cannot go straight from one grant to the next. The national rule is a wait of 12 months after the Priming Grant was approved or drawn down, whichever is later.

An office can waive that in a case of exceptional merit where you drew down less than the maximum. Some offices are stricter. Galway, Meath, Mayo, Waterford and Carlow all say 18 months.

All your grants count towards one limit. This is de minimis State aid, and a business cannot receive more than €300,000 of it from all public sources in any three years. The form asks you to list everything you have received.

How to apply, step by step

1. Ring or email the office for the area where the business operates. Each one runs its own process, so look up your county's office and how it handles grant applications.
2. Meet a business adviser. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown asks for an expression of interest first and replies within about 10 working days. Dublin City uses an online eligibility assessment.
3. Hold off on spending. An application has to be in before any cost is taken on.
4. Fill in the form, online or on paper depending on the office, and attach the documents.
5. The office checks it and can come back with questions. Limerick and Cork City only take a limited number of applications in each round, so do not leave it to the closing day.
6. The Evaluation and Approvals Committee decides at its next meeting. The decision comes in writing.

What you have to write and send

Wicklow's form for this grant is 28 pages long. It asks about the owners' experience, the product, pricing and suppliers, your customers and any new orders that support the expansion, your marketing and your competitors. Five of the answers must run to at least 150 words.

You also have to explain why the business needs the grant and what would happen without it. A project that would go ahead anyway is one of the stated reasons for refusal.

The documents to send with it:

• your latest certified accounts. Dublin City also wants management accounts no more than three months old
• financial projections on the office's template. Dublin City asks for three years. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown asks for a two-year cashflow, a three-year profit and loss forecast and three years of staffing numbers
• three written quotes for anything costing €5,000 or more, and one quote for smaller items
• evidence of your own matching funds, such as bank statements or a loan approval letter
• evidence that your tax affairs are in order
• a diagram of the group structure, if the business is part of a group

Getting paid, and paying part of it back

You spend first and claim afterwards. Kildare explains that equipment must be fully paid for, installed and on site before the office pays its share, and someone from the office comes out to inspect it. Cash payments are not accepted, and equipment bought with the grant must be insured.

Salary support comes in two halves: at the start of the job and six months later. Kildare says the grant supports the position and not the person, so you can replace someone who leaves, but the position must stay filled for at least three years.

Part of the money may be repayable. Kildare says up to 35% of an expansion grant may be repayable, normally starting 12 months after the last payment. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown issues this grant as part grant, part repayable at 0% interest.

If you are refused, you can appeal in writing through the office within four working weeks. A National Appeals Panel aims to deal with it inside two months, and its decision is final.

Common questions

Keep reading

• how the start-up version of this form is laid out