There are very good reasons, of course, for Britain being known as a nation of shop-keepers. Sadly, however, it is also a nation of fretful shop-keepers, who have a seemingly endless succession of risks and perils facing their businesses. The anxieties can range from worries about the premises themselves, the stock, public or employers' liabilities, and the potentially fatal impact of business disruption.

If you are an employer, one of the facts of life you'll have to face is that you have legal requirements. If you ever suffer a problem in these areas and are held to be legally liable, then you could end up writing out some very large cheques indeed - unless you have some form of employers' insurance in place to help.

When you run your own business, an essential part of making sure that things still run along smoothly in the event that the unexpected happens is by having business cover, such as small company insurance, in place. This can typically cover physical objects such as contents, buildings, tools etc, as well as potential liability claims.

If you're running a small business then there is a good chance that you spend a lot of your time thinking how you can do things more economically. Yet trying to save money by ignoring public liability insurance could prove paradoxically to be a very expensive mistake.

It is difficult to think of a shop as being anything other than a relatively safe place but sadly accidents and troubles can happen anywhere. If you do not have good shop insurance then it will be you and your bank account that has to foot the bill.

There are two old retail-related sayings that are both very true. The first of these runs along the lines of "you can't turn your premises into a risk-free fortress". The second is "if it is possible for a customer to have an accident then they will".  The two taken together are a powerful argument for retail insurance because by definition, sooner or later something is going to go wrong.

There are so many things to think about when you are running a business. Stock and staff seem to drain your finances, so you may wonder whether your small business needs to buy insurance. 

If you run a small business, it can be difficult to tell what kind of insurance is essential, and what cover is merely optional. 

Competitive shop insurance is essential to keep costs down if you are running a small retail business. 

There is no fixed definition of small business insurance. Each small business is unique, and as such carries its own particular risks and rewards. 

If you're operating a shop (where members of the public will be ‘served'), you may wish to think carefully about shop insurance. 

That's because your type of business is different to many others in several important respects.