Archive Surveying and Rescue

A major role of the Council is to undertake archives surveys of collections of records relating to business and industry in Scotland.  Since the Council's inception in 1960, hundreds of surveys have been carried out.  Organisations that have been surveyed include:

• trade unions
• trade associations
• manufacturers
• engineers
• ship owners
• saw millers
• small independent traders
• undertakers
• drinks companies
• prominent industrialists and businessmen.

This work has been funded through a grant from the National Archives of Scotland and contributions from businesses and our members.

Occasionally a business will fail and its assets, including its records, will either be sold-off or will be earmarked for destruction.  The Council has a watching brief to be there to help rescue archives in such situations.  Again, since 1960s, BACS has helped to rescue a large number of archives and see them safely transferred to archive repositories where they can be accessed by the public. 

From 2009, BACS has worked with the UK wide Crisis Management Team.  This team was created as an outcome of the English and Welsh Business Archives Strategy and in 2011 the Scottish Strategy. The team was created to represent all parts of the archive sector to organise agreed responses to business archives under threat and it exists to monitor and assist in steering records at risk into suitable homes.

Details of the team members are now available on the Managing Business Archives website.  The Scottish Representative is Kiara King, Ballast Trust Archivist.  If you are aware of business records at risk in Scotland then please contact Kiara by email at Kiara.King@glasgow.ac.uk or on 01505 328488.