Tell us your good news

‘For Men To Talk’, the peer support group, based in Bedfordshire, is delighted to confirm that they have received financial funding from the Bedfordshire and Luton Community Foundation to grow their work in 2023.

As part of the ‘GVC Fund’, ‘For Men To Talk’ will continue their work, which they have been providing for three years, to provide a safe and comfortable environment for men to talk about how they are feeling and their overall mental health.

“The meetings are very informal”, said founder Luke Newman. “To improve the wellbeing of men, it is important to connect to people. As well as receiving emotional support, it allows men to support others. With the funding received, it will allow For Men To Talk to keep building on its progress and give more men the opportunity to attend the 124 meetings planned in 2023.”

Last year was one of the darkest ever. I lost my dad to cancer, along with four other close friends and as the cost of living crisis cripples, I felt done. So to have received a reward for my business, Mancmade Ltd for Best Style & Apparel Cottage Industry in Greater Manchester 2022, brought back the drive needed to move forward. I was also awarded a contract to deliver a production sewing machine programme, in conjunction with the UKFT and Salford College. Which I currently deliver, alongside my 'pay as you sew' online sewing courses. I am confident about the future of the company and looking to take on staff members.

The British & Commonwealth Chamber of Commerce in Finland (B3CF) raised £5,000 for HM armed forces veterans by being the first to take the London Lord Mayor's Big Curry Lunch global.

The LMBCL is a City of London fundraising event and last year, B3CF hosted the first international satellite event for the LMBCL, in Helsinki, Finland, inspiring other British bilateral chambers to follow their lead.

It is the goal of B3CF Executive Director Vladislav Dobrokhotov to bring other British & Commonwealth Chambers aboard and together raise a further £200,000 for UK National Service Charities such as the ABF The Soldiers' Charity, Royal Navy & Royal Marine Charity, and Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund.

My business is in its 3rd year of trading during what, arguably, have been the three toughest years for the economy, for society and the general welfare of the people of the UK. In spite of all the negative economic conditions that might’ve been put in our way, we’ve grown profitability year-on-year and are feeling very positive about our future.

As the old adage goes, ‘when you hit rock bottom, the only way is up’. Being a startup during a pandemic was a fairly freeing experience where our expectation was ‘anything could happen’. When you aren’t trying to hold onto what you could lose, an entrepreneurial spirit has to kick in and with this comes the opportunity to seize whatever comes your way. There have been as many winners from the 2020-2023 period as there were losers, and we feel fortunate to be grouped in with the winners.

We won our biggest bid with a local authority in London to deliver Startup School for Seniors and provide those over 50 with the skills, training and support to turn an idea into a business. This funding comes with financial support (real cash) for 20 businesses that complete the programme, so it's VERY exciting! Can say more after we meet with the local authority next week when we hope to generate media interest as it's a BIG deal. :)

I run a mortgage broker based in Leeds and after being very nervous in October and November last year I was not looking forward to the notoriously quiet Christmas and New Year period at all and equally as worried for 2023. Then December came and was busier than December 2021 which has then carried through into 2023. I have done more mortgages this year than last year and am finding clients are still looking to buy, the property market is still moving and I am very positive about the coming year. We are even looking to take on another advisor for Manchester in the next few months too.

I recently celebrated the 25,000 downloaded episode of my niche podcast: the Aspiring Psychologist Podcast. In these tricky economic times, it's been wonderful to serve people for free over the last 13 months and it's superb that people are finding it to be such a useful resource. It also puts compassionate and evidence-based approaches and advice in the hands of people working on the frontline of the mental health crisis.

This year we’re thrilled to be running 7 group holidays, rather than our usual 5 – ensuring more children can receive a much-needed break from their day-to-day challenges. We’ve opened up our volunteer applications with 30% of places filled within the first 24 hours, and now we’re busy recruiting the rest of our 180+ summer camp volunteers who will be there to make sure the kids who need it most have an amazing week away and create memories to last a lifetime.

Tratech Consulting is continuing to go from strength to strength, growing our client base significantly and employing some very exciting new staff. We anticipate a very strong 2023 due to businesses wanting to streamline processes and reduce costs. We continue to support a local charity preschool and will be looking to expand our involvement in the Farnborough community.

Tratech Consulting is very end-user focused and a lot of Retail and Hospitality firms are putting a lot of energy into the customer journey and experience. This leads to some very exciting conversations about the future of both industries.

We’re on track for record February sales in our bricks and mortar shop - For the Love of the North and have launched a collaboration with our local food bank - The Bay Food Bank. For every FTLOTN adult garment sold in 2023 (including this sweatshirt), a full day of meals will be donated to someone who finds themselves in financial crisis through our partner food bank - The Bay Foodbank.

We’re very positive about sales in 2023 and how we’ll be able to use these to support our community as much as possible

We have been receiving lots of awards recently.
We won a Poole Business Award for Employee of the year.
We won a 1st place gold award from Dorset Tourism for Experience of the Year.
We are about to receive an award from South West Tourism for experience of the year: we are yet to find out on the 23rd of March if it's bronze, silver or gold.

If you can find any radio or print opportunities for a multi award winning powerboat school that would be amazing please.

Our financial planning business is going well in many aspects following a few years (like everyone) of difficulties caused by the pandemic, illness and insolvency of key partners. Clients- have benefitted from the work we have done in reducing the overall prices of services. We have recently launched our online community - Ubuntu - perhaps the first of its kind in the UK for financial advisory firms, where we are bringing together our clients for well-being, social walks, nights, yoga, access to counseling, and banter! Several clients have also sold businesses for large sums and many more are moving to retirement for the life they want to enjoy. For the firm - we are moving to an employee ownership model so all staff benefit. Love is in the air with multiple marriages! We have trained 3 new advisers in 2 years with a national shortage.

I fell in love with the pub culture but I was sorry to see how people deserted these places dedicated to gatherings, especially independent pubs.
I decided to help prevent the disappearance of these businesses with a unique gift for pub lovers and launched CityStack: a £20 stack of beer mats that allows pub lovers to get £100 worth of food & drinks at ten independent pubs across London.
This pack offers ten money-saving beer mats, each giving £10 off a £20 spend at one of the ten pubs that are part of the collection. When it is time to pay, the user gives the bespoke beer mat to receive a £10 discount on their bill.
In October 2021, I was able to select ten amazing independent pubs ready to kickstart the adventure with me. Since then, we started to generate sales both online and in shops. More pubs reach out to join us.

Logica Digital, a leading digital marketing agency, based in Sheffield, has taken on three new members of staff, and is moving to larger premises in the city, due to demand.

The company specialises in providing a wide range of digital marketing services, including search engine optimisation (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, social media marketing, and content marketing. To service current clients and support the influx of new clients Logica has employed; Jill Rendardson as Office Manager, Connor Young as Digital Marketing Executive and Kezia Humphries as Content Executive. The company has also promoted Lucy Forrest to Digital Account Manager to offer clients a more personalised service and to ensure the team is well managed.

We are in #EB100 LIST!
Celebrated as one of the top-performing SME Businesses in the UK, I am pleased to announce that we are a finalist in the #EB100.

From hundreds of entries across every sector, my brand has been ranked 94 overall in the Elite Business 100 (EB100). We will celebrate at the awards evening on March 17th in London and be included in the EB100 digital guide and online directory with a viewership of over half a million people.

Check it out here: https://elitebusinessmagazine.co.uk/eb100-winners
Paulomi Debnath
Handmade by Tinni
https://www.handmadebytinni.com/

Brave individuals whose lives have been affected by cancer took to the catwalk modelling sustainable fashion at an event to support a range of causes.

Last night's fundraising event at the Drumossie Hotel in Inverness generated £74,000.

It will go to Highland Hospice and the End of Life Care Together partnership – which includes organisations across voluntary, health and social care including Highland Hospice, NHS Highland, Marie Curie Cancer Care and Macmillan Cancer Relief – will also benefit.

People modelled clothing from hospice boutiques and told their own individual stories.

The event was organised by Alison McRitchie, who runs the Head Gardener salon in Church Street.

https://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/news/74k-raised-at-catwalk-for-a-cause-303111/

At the beginning of 2023, I made a conscious decision to take control of what I could and decided goalsetting would give me focus.

I posted on LinkedIn that one of my goals for the year would be to host a retreat. I hadn’t got as far as how, where or when.

Two weeks later after an unexpected turn of events, I had a organised a whole weekend of workshops, and it had sold out in less than a week.

Another goal was to work on sharing my skills and again, my workshops and sea glass safari weekends are filling up.

I’m still monitoring the smart meter, working in less than ideal temperatures at times and preparing for a mortgage rise at the end of the year, but doing what I love, puts the silver lining on those sometimes, very dark clouds.

It’s the best start to my year, since I started in lockdown.

Clean water, a resource that many people in developed countries take for granted, is a luxury in certain parts of the world.

More than 300 million of the 800 million people living in Sub-Saharan Africa live in water-scarce environments. Without access to safe drinking water, diseases associated with poor hygiene, improper sanitation, and contaminated water develop.

To honour my family's history, provide a legacy and celebrate half a century on this planet. I will give back to the community where my family home was prior to being expelled in 1972 by Idi Amin the military dictator. My parents were lucky that they were merely deported, rather than butchered like thousands of others.

For my 50th birthday, I am funding the drilling of a new borehole (water well) in the area surrounding Kamuli.

Late diagnosis of cancer is a major issue in the UK, causing thousands of needless deaths each year. This is something that Doncaster-based Accendo Supplies are working on changing in 2023, through the introduction of a new test for cancer, The HrC Test.

The HrC Test is a simple blood test that can detect the absence, imminence or presence of cancer.

Currently, with existing technology for detecting cancer, there is not one single test that can definitively state whether or not a person has cancer.

Instead, there are a series of tests, mainly for specific cancer types which offer varying rates of detection, across various stages of the disease, for a limited number of cancers.

In contrast, The HrC Test offers a 99% rate of detection, across all stages of the disease, for all cancers.

Health and wellbeing are paramount to your overall success in life.Without health there is no real wealth.I started my private GP home visiting service 2 years ago at the height of lockdown. Potentially the worst timing ever?Well actually no – because I offered a unique service of bespoke health care, tailored around patients needs it struck a chord with people. They loved the fact that I was available at the end of the phone – no dragon receptionist to interrogate them – I visited them at home at their convenience, arranged onward referrals for them.It wasn’t plain sailing by any means, in fact my income took a large hit.But now things seem to have turned the corner. December 2022 and January 2023 were the busiest months for me, ever! People are coming back to see me several times, they are referring me to their contacts. Join them!

Despite the gloom surrounding Post-Brexit, we are excited about 2023 as we see it as a year where we establish ourselves as a key technology provider for companies who want to communicate with their customers more effectively. As an international company with two UK offices, we continue to invest in and grow our UK operations which are seen as a strategic part of the company's overall goal of becoming one of the top 10 global providers in our field, within the next five years. We continue to expand in the UK and have already committed to attend several exhibitions and events in 2023 as we see people returning to them. Our philosophy has always been to involve our people in the company's success paying bonuses for everyone based on company performance as well as making one-off payments in 2022 to help with the cost of living crisis.

I'm confident about 2023 as more and more people are realising that they can't rely on the standard health offers anymore and are ready to proactively take their health and well-being into their own hands, well body.

As a TRE (Tension Releasing Exercises) Provider, I work with many clients who are keen to tackle their (head) aches and (back) pains themselves, rather than passively lingering on a waiting list.

The transformations I see are heart-warming as learning and practising TRE not only releases stress and tension, it also down-regulates the nervous system so that the person can feel calmer, more relaxed, stronger and generally much more resilient – priceless in current times.

Bring it on!

Natural. Innate. TREmendous.

New World looks to close the advice gap

39 million UK adults don’t take any form of professional advice or guidance when it comes to looking after their finances, despite evidence showing those that did receive advice were over £47,000 better off over 10 years. In fact, those individuals who were ‘just getting by’ experienced the greatest benefits.

New World Financial Group are looking to close this gap and break down the barriers to advice. We've extended our subscription service, and are now able to offer everyone under the age of 50 full financial advice and planning without an initial charge.

Director Lisa Tipton says ’we’ve seen first-hand the impact that high-quality financial planning can have on an individual's financial and emotional wellbeing. It is our mission to make financial planning fully inclusive.'

2023 is shaping up to be our best year yet! Web Goddess have just taken on another part-time employee and our business shows no sign of slowing down.

In times of crisis, we see that our customers usually double down on existing efforts to bring in their own customers and websites are a huge part of that. So, we are seeing a massive influx of returning clients wanting to know how they can improve their online presence.

We're making sure our business caters to that need and it is paying dividends.

Whilst running a small business single-handedly is a bump rollercoaster at the best of times, my business turnover has increased by 137% since the pre-pandemic lockdown, and another growth year is predicted (at the time of writing) for 2022/23. I attribute this to many firms looking to procurement (contracts and tenders) during the pandemic as the safest source of income and needing my services to help them write a compelling application. However, the pandemic has taught me well - be cautious, evaluate every spending decision and keep a very close eye on the finances.

At Onoco, we're seeing a positive start to 2023 with a 30% increase in users. Much of the news around parenting is incredibly negative at the moment, across both the US and UK, as parents are facing a myriad of obstacles and issues including financial pressures, living apart from wider family and thereby missing that 'built in' childcare which is often assumed as available, and the onslaught of advice - and often criticism - faced daily on social media. With Onoco, parents can cut through some of this noise and access their personalised and unique data to be able to make informed decisions, together.

And our feedback tells this story:
"This is such a brilliant app - I can't quite believe it's free for all you get!"
"Can't fault this app. Soo much better than having everything in my notes."
"Best of these apps I've tried."