It has been two months since the East Midlands Development Agency (emda) staged its biggest ever business support events to help Northamptonshire businesses withstand the pressures of the economic downturn.
Since the December event, the downturn has gathered pace, but many businesses have heeded the expert advice they heard at the Survive & Thrive event and have benefited from it.
Survive & Thrive delivered expert talks by Shoosmiths, Freeth Cartwright and Cooper Parry and was attended by around 2,000 businesses from across the East Midlands.
BDL Tool & Die Company Ltd, based in Daventry, was one of the companies that attended the Northampton event. The business, which employs over 40 skilled people, manufactures specialist carbide extrusion and heading dies and has been supplying high quality steel and carbide tooling to the aerospace, automotive, construction and electronic industry sectors worldwide for nearly 20 years.
Anne Bartasius from BDL Tool & Die wanted to get advice on what to look out for and plan for during the economic downturn. Speaking about the event, Ms Bartasius said: “The expert advice we received from Survive & Thrive has made us focus on improving our processes, from meeting customer expectations to reducing costs. We have alternative suppliers, negotiated different working hours with our staff, but nonetheless have had to make some redundancies. We have maintained our customer base and we are working more closely with our customers to ensure regular orders for our tooling.”
Also in the audience was Colin St John, General Manager at Freefoam, a leading manufacturer of PVC-U and PVC-UE building products. The Northampton-based company is certified by the Royal Institute of British Architects to provide continuing professional development to architects and other construction industry professionals. Colin St John attended the Northampton event to ensure that the company’s processes and procedures were the right ones to see them through the downturn.
Mr. St. John said: “The construction industry is always seen as a barometer to the state of the wider economy and we needed to make sure that we’d got everything in place and to learn from other industry sectors. Since the event we have continued with our plans for development in the knowledge that we are doing the right things. The advice we got from the Survive & Thrive event has backed-up our existing plans and given us the reassurance that we need. We have been able to continue with our high levels of customer care and new product development while minimising our risks.”
As a follow up to Survive & Thrive, an event which is being delivered by the Northamptonshire Chamber of Commerce, to deal with many of the issues that businesses highlighted as further areas of concern. Showcase, Market and Sell! is a one-day conference which is being held at Kettering Conference Centre on Wednesday 30th March.
This free event will give those businesses unable to attend the Survive & Thrive events the opportunity to showcase themselves with a free exhibition stand, network with other businesses, generate more business and attend advice sessions on sales and marketing in a recession.
Throughout the afternoon, there will also be an opportunity to pitch to large corporate and public sector buyers.
To deal with the issues of businesses accessing financial support, emda has announced the introduction of the East Midlands’ Transition Loan Fund which will provide loans of between £50,000 and £250,000 to businesses that are having difficulties obtaining funding through traditional routes.
In addition, the government has also launched an Enterprise Finance Guarantee Scheme, providing guaranteed loans for small businesses which turnover up to £25m; and a Capital for Enterprise Fund, which guarantees loans to businesses with a turnover of up to £500m.
Jeff Moore, Chief Executive of emda said: “The terrific attendance at the Survive & Thrive events clearly demonstrated that there was, and still is, a great demand from businesses to receive practical advice and support to help them through the current economic difficulties. We have built on the success of these events by publishing a regular e-newsletter on the Survive & Thrive website. It gives accurate, well-informed advice and support to help businesses deal with the challenges ahead so that they can hopefully not only get through the downturn, but also thrive and grow when the upturn comes.”
Companies can view the latest Survive & Thrive newsletters by visiting www.surviveandthrive.org.uk, where they can also access presentations from the events.
To access information, advice and support to help your business, call 0845 058 6644 or visit www.businesslink.gov.uk/eastmidlands
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Issued on behalf of Business Link and emda by Lava. For further information please contact Matt or Lindsey at Lava on 01522 842800 / 07870 567 968 or matt@lavapr.co.uk / lindsey@lavapr.co.uk
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Notes to editors:
About emda
• East Midlands Development Agency (emda) is one of nine Regional Development Agencies in England, set up in 1999 to bring a regional focus to economic development.
• Working in partnership with public, private and voluntary organisations the aim is to deliver the 2006 Regional Economic Strategy (RES) ‘A Flourishing Region’, which sets out regional priorities until 2020.
• The RES, coordinated by emda, highlights the themes of productivity, sustainability and equality and builds on the previous two strategies; ‘Prosperity Through People’ and ‘Destination 2010’.
• In early 2007 the National Audit Office announced emda had received the highest possible grade of ‘performing strongly’ in an independent assessment of our work – scoring 22 out of 24.
• For more details visit www.emda.org.uk.
About Showcase Market and Sell
· Showcase Market and Sell is being managed by Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Chamber on behalf of the East Midlands Development Agency (emda) and is delivered in conjunction with the local Chamber of Commerce in each county.
