Download - Mind Your Own Business!
MIND YOUR OWN
the newsletter of Business Insightpart of Business & Learning, Central Library
www.businesssupporter.co.uk No4Issue
BUSINESS!
Welcome to Issue No4!
The Feature BitPURO Birmingham’s new ORGANIC hair salonHAIR
Over the years BI has helped many enterprising individuals take their firststeps on the road to running their own business. In what we hope will bea regular feature of our newsletter we spoke to one former BI client, SarahSimpson-Davies, at her fantastic new hair salon PURO now open forbusiness right in the city centre.
HAIR
This time we get stuck straight in tothe meaty stuff. Enjoy!
business plan! The know-how she acquired even encouraged her to file her own, successful,application for Trade Mark protection for the business. Even better, the Trade Mark grant alsoextends to branded products.
The business has been running now for 5 weeks and Sarah is experiencing the typical roller-coaster of busy and quieter days. 'Live' experience is enabling her to work on refinements toher on-going marketing plan and to tweak other aspects of the business.Some aspects of the start-up, like the shop-fitting, were more stressful than anticipated, whileothers, including the actual day-to-day running of the business are proving to be easier thanexpected. Looking back on the whole process Sarah is convinced that proper preparation madeall the difference. As she herself told us, she chose to ignore advice to 'just get on with it' infavour of doing extensive planning and research. Her advice to anyone else thinking about set-ting-up for themselves is to do likewise! I’m sure you’ll join us in wishing her and her businessthe very best of luck!
This is Sarah’s first foray into business and shewanted to make sure that she did it right. It wasimportant for her that the business have a prop-er structure from the start and she was able totake advantage of a referral chain that includedBusiness Link, Business Insight and our numerousonline resources. From these resources we wereable to provide a template for Sarah's businessplan, a marketing template, crucial businessstart-up information through the 'Cobra' data-base and 'Mintel' market research reports,access to a patent attorney to discuss TradeMark protection and ongoing support through 1-on-1business advice sessions.
Using these tools Sarah successfully applied fora 'Retail Development Grant' obtaining the
Sarah Simpson-Davies, founder of PURO HAIR
maximum £10,000 award on the strength of her
Don’t forget if you want to form a company that is Limited byShares (the classic ‘Ltd’ company) you can do it on our website www.businesssupporter.co.uk. Just follow the link ‘Starting aBusiness’ on the Categories menu, click on ‘Company FormationService’ then fill in the online form following the simple instruc-tions. Once it’s done you can pay online by credit/debit card.It’s £79.00 inclusive and for this you get your company formedwithin 24 hours* and all of the relevant documents sent directly toan address provided by you. It’s as simple as that!
*Very occassionally, volume of business or technical issues may result in slight delay.
The Service BitLegal Clarity Company Formation
‘Assistive Technology’ in BIThe term ‘assistive technology’ can be definedas ‘any device or system that allows an individual to perform a task that they wouldotherwise be unable to do, or increases theease and safety with which the task can beperformed’. (Royal Commission on Long TermCare 1999)
And we have got ourselves some smart new assistive kit for adult userswith learning disabilities. It has touchscreen functionallity, large keyboardand for those of you in the know ‘Out and About 1-4’ which helps withgeneral life skills.We’ve recently had an advocacy group in from Kidderminster to use theequipment and they gave it a big thumbs-up. So why not come along andtry it out for yourself?
The Calendar Bit
Global Entrepreneurship Week
Workshops
As usual BI will be hosting a week of FREE events, talks and workshops addressing the issues of allthings entrepreneurial. Every year this event has got better and better and through it we havedeveloped a network of inspirational contributors from the World of Business. They are just gagging to impart their knowledge and expertise to all the budding Alan Sugars and DeborahMeaden’s out there! So if you’re thinking about striking out on the path of self-employment make sure you mark theweek 15th - 20th November in your diary, and look out for further information nearer the date.Of course you could always contact us and we’d be happy to keep you up-dated on the event, aswell as on all of our regular services.
GBBO (Getting British Business Online) workshops will be taking place in the Central Library in September. Asthe title suggets, they will explore some of the means and methods available to you to get your business online,and to exploit that online presence to the fullest possible advantage. And they’re free!
Venue:: ICT Suite, Learning Centre, First Floor, Central Library
Dates: Monday 6th & Monday 13th September
Time:: 09.00 - 13.00
For further information get in touch and ask for Anthony Blagg or Debbie Assinder.
GBBO
HMRC Workshops27th September 2010 Newly Self-Employed 10 - 12.30
21st October 2010 Newly Self-Employed 10 - 12.30
30th November 2010 Newly Self-Employed 10 - 12.30
Social Enterprise Advice Sessions
8th September
15th September
22nd September
Here’s a second shot across the bows for Global Entrepreneurship Week
1 - to - 1 sessions with specialist advisers insocial and community enterprises.
Contact us to book your place.
Duties range from overseeing our business periodicals, through time-tabling the customer-facing staff rota (including myself) and providingadministrative support for a number of partnerships to giving businessadvise to potential small start-up enterprises. And, depending on whetherit’s a well staffed day or not, making my colleagues life a misery!
I’m currently studying for a BA with the Open University to keep the old grey matter active and to keep my research skills honed.Do I make a difference to the people who use our services? We’ll I suppose you’d have to ask them, but I certainly hope so. After all, they are our lifeblood; if our customers weren’t getting what they came for they’d stop coming and that would be the end of libraries.
The Staff BitHaere Mai Birmingham!
Geo Kemp here, all the way fromNew Zealand, now residing in theWest Midlands and working forBusiness Insight in the Central Library.I have been with BI for nearly 7 yearsnow and am one of the in-houseBusiness Advisers. I come from abackground in banking and telecom-munications; I did a long stint withNew Zealand Telecom where I led theVideo Conferencing team for severalyears before moving to the UK.My role in Business Insight is varied
BUSINESS INSIGHT CONTACTS
Phone: 0121 303 4531 Fax: 0121 303 4532
www.businesssupporter.co.uk www.facebook.com/BusinessandLearning
www.Twitter.com/BhamBusinesswww.YouTube.com/businessandlearning1
Central Library, Chamberlain Square,Birmingham B3 3HQ
Now check out the Learning Centre, our partner in Business & Learning.Don’t let a gap in your knowledge spoil your dream of being your own boss.In the Learning Centre you will find all the advice, resources and supportyou need for brushing up your existing skills and learning new ones,whether for business or leisure.
LEARNING CENTRE CONTACTS0121 303 4306
[email protected]/learningcentre
Central Library, Chamberlain Square,Birmingham B3 3HQ
