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Posted: Mon 29th Jul 2024
Earlier in 2024, we partnered with Birmingham Enterprise Community (BEC) to launch Start Your Growth Journey, a programme that helps early-stage social enterprises in the West Midlands build the foundations they need to grow and prosper.
The 42 businesses that joined the year-long programme receive free training and a £2,000 grant to develop the skills and confidence they need to move their ventures to the next stages of growth.
As the programme is now halfway through, we were keen to find out what support and guidance the participants have received so far, and how it's helped them. Here's what they told us:
Infound CIC is a start-up social enterprise that provides recreational activities for children (and their families) who are autistic or have special educational needs and disabilities.
Overall, we've had a great experience. It's been great to match up with other entrepreneurs, receive advice on how to grow our business, and learn more about accessing grant funding.
Although the in-person events have been a highlight, the online training sessions that I could do from the comfort of my own home were super-valuable. They were really easy to access and helped me understand the value of using networking to generate more awareness of our social economy business.
We've also received a small grant of £400, which we've put towards marketing. We've brought in someone to support us with grant writing so we can submit further applications to councils.
Overall, Start Your Growth Journey has taught us how we can grow and what next steps we need to take. It's completely opened up our network, connecting us with valuable contacts and helping us be part of a great movement for the social economy.
Ways for Wellbeing UK is a community interest company (CIC) established by four women of colour. It provides access to creative activities that promote wellbeing and overall positive mental health.
We saw the Start your Growth Journey programme as a great opportunity to learn and grow our social economy business. So far, we're finding it really useful.
Specifically, we really enjoy the in-person monthly meet-up events, which are a great way to network and meet others.
We featured Ways for Wellbeing UK in a stand at the Social Economy Olympic Summit event in July. That gave us a clearer idea of how well our services would be received. We were also able to speak directly to Richard Parker, Mayor of the West Midlands, ask questions and raise our concerns about the social economy sector.
West Midlands Sports Developments is an organisation that runs sports holiday camps for children to be active, play games and learn new skills and how to make healthy lifestyle choices.
We've received funding for a part-time volunteer coordinator role for the business. That means we can elevate our current volunteer Juliana's role into a paid position to run for six months, at 24 hours a week.
Our goal is to create 20 volunteer opportunities within our community by December 2024.
