The hashtag #ForgottenLtd was trending over the weekend as small businesses detailed their plight.

Among them was retouching and pre-media expert Bill Greenwood.

“The crux of it is that the Forgotten Ltd is about all businesses, but there will be many businesses involved in the printing industry who are affected,” he said.

“In France they have supported all business. But here businesses and people are falling through the cracks.

“The whole issue is parity and there is no parity. People are being offered loans that they don’t know how they will pay back.”

Greenwood said that government support in line with the self-employed assistance scheme “would make sense”, and pointed out that many small traders were required to have a limited company setup by their clients. 

He said that he still had some work, but that photo shoots and associated retouching requirements had completely stopped. “The photographic industry has been decimated,” he added.

Graphic designer Antony Mcdonald, Yvonne Gorman the owner of Essential Print Services in Derby, and Print Solutions in Peterborough also tweeted about the small business predicament.

I run @essentialprint. I employ four people. I have been in business nine years. I want to help the economy recover. I am a #ForgottenLtd @scullymike @RishiSunak @UKParliament pic.twitter.com/zhJkUJUVJF

— Von Leafe 🌿 (Gorman) (@Yvonnegorman) May 3, 2020

Organisations supporting the campaign claim that some 2m businesses employing more than 13m people are affected.