Feasibility Study Grant: up to €15,000 to test a business idea, for makers and exporters only

What it pays

The grant pays 50% of the cost of the study, up to €15,000. To get the full €15,000 at that rate you would be spending €30,000.

The rate is 60% in the Border, Midlands and West region. The offices in Cavan, Donegal, Galway, Laois, Louth, Mayo, Offaly, Sligo and Westmeath publish that rate on their own pages. Monaghan and Roscommon quote both rates. Ask your office which one applies to you.

Most grants are well under the ceiling. In 2025 the offices approved 274 Feasibility Study Grants worth €2,878,649, which is about €10,500 each. Dublin City says its own average is about €10,000.

You pay for the work first and claim the grant back against receipts. VAT is not covered.

Who can apply, and who is excluded

You do not need to have a business yet. The official wording is that "only businesses or individuals intending to explore the feasibility of a manufacturing or internationally traded service sector business may apply".

That one sentence is what shuts most people out. If the business you are researching is a shop, a cafe, a salon, a trade, a building firm or a professional practice, it is not eligible. The Local Enterprise Office eligibility page says its grant aid "does not support" retail, personal services, professional services, or construction and local building services.

The idea also has to pass these tests:

• the business has, or will have, no more than 10 employees
• it is, or will be, based in the area of the office you apply to
• you can point to a market for the product or service
• you have done enough early research to show a full study is worth doing
• there is a reasonable chance the idea would create jobs

Offices consider these grants for ideas whose finished business could go on to apply for further Local Enterprise Office grants, such as a Priming Grant.

If your idea is excluded, what you can use instead

A local business idea can still get help, just not this grant.

• Before you start: a Start Your Own Business course and one-to-one mentoring at the Local Enterprise Office.
• To fund the start: the State-backed loans for businesses with fewer than 10 staff, which the office can help you apply for.
• For a premises: money off commercial rates if you open in a vacant unit, in council areas that run a scheme.
• Once you have traded for six months: a 50% voucher for off-the-shelf software and up to €10,000 towards lower-energy fridges, ovens and controls.
• If you have a limited company with a technical question to answer: €10,000 of research time at a college, in almost any sector.

What the money can be spent on

• Market research. Outside costs of testing whether people will buy.
• Consultancy. Including design, architect and legal fees.
• Technical development, prototypes and innovation. Prototype development, design, research costs and work done by a third-level college. Sligo pays 60% in general but funds prototypes at 50%.
• Your own time. The national scheme allows it. Offices such as Wicklow, Louth and Offaly cap it at €400 a week and 20% of the grant. Galway, Donegal and Cork City do not pay for your own labour at all.
• Miscellaneous costs. Phone, mileage at €0.26 a kilometre, flights and overnight stays, up to 20% of the grant.

The grant is for finding out whether an idea is worth pursuing. It is not for running the business, and it does not cover anything spent before you applied.

How to apply, step by step

1. Contact the Local Enterprise Office for your area. The official list of offices has contact details for all 31.
2. Meet a business adviser. In Wicklow and Dublin City you must do this before you can submit a form. The adviser tells you whether the idea is in an eligible sector.
3. Get quotes from the people who would do the research: one quote for anything under €5,000 and three for anything over.
4. Fill in the form and send it with the quotes, proof of your own share of the money, and your latest accounts if you are already trading. Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown also asks for a two-year cashflow projection.
5. The office acknowledges it, meets you to go through it, and may ask for more.
6. The Evaluation and Approvals Committee decides at its next meeting and you are told in writing.
7. Do the study, pay for it, then claim the grant with invoices, proof of payment, a tax clearance certificate and a written report on what the study found.

What you have to write

Wicklow publishes its form, which is 20 pages long. The written parts ask for:

• your education, training and business experience, in at least 150 words
• the business idea you want to research, and why
• what you have found out so far about market size, growth, trends and competitors
• the tasks in the study, how they will be done, the start date and the timescale
• who will carry out the work, their qualifications, and copies of their proposals
• what has to go right: technology, licences, finance, standards, skills, intellectual property
• the jobs the business could create in its first year
• each cost, and how you will pay your share
• whether the study would go ahead without the grant
• any other State grants in the last three years

The form also asks whether you have talked to any other agency about the idea, and whether you considered an Innovation Voucher for the same work.

If the committee refuses the application, you can appeal in writing through the office within four working weeks. A National Appeals Panel aims to review it within two months, and its decision is final.

Common questions

Keep reading

• the form that comes after a feasibility study, and who may use it