Member News

With improving rail and road links in Norfolk, plus the many proposed developments, such as the proposed expansion of the University and Norwich Research Park, there are likely to be a lot of new people moving to the area. 

This has led to a large number of new homes being built. Norwich Sunblinds noticed that people often plan all their finance around buying their new home but forget to budget for essentials, such as window dressings. “We decided to create packages so that customers could have fitted blinds in their new home at a set price,” says Fiona Garwood, a director of Norwich Sunblinds. The packages are available for various sizes of flats and houses, based on the number of windows and type of property. There are also executive packages available which include real-wood shutters and roman blinds. Of course, the house doesn’t have to be new-build. The packages are available to anyone who is moving home and needs new blinds, curtains or shutters for all their windows. “There is so much to think about when moving home,” says Fiona “we can at least take away the stress of fitting blinds to all the windows. We visit, measure, make and fit the blinds for our customers. After all, you want privacy as soon as you move in.” If you are excited about the colour scheme for your room, you will love the range of fabrics to choose from. Norwich Sunblinds is an independent family business, so is not tied to any one fabric supplier.  However, if the thought of looking through fabric leaves you cold, Norwich Sunblinds can help you choose colours and styles to suit your home.  It is this personal service, quality products and their 5-year guarantee, that gives rise to their 99% satisfaction rating on the Norfolk County Council Trusted Trader website. “Norwich Sunblinds have just installed vertical and roller blinds in my home and I am so pleased with the service provided by them, the quality of the blinds is outstanding and the installer was so polite and very neat and tidy; I wouldn’t hesitate in recommending Norwich Sunblinds to anyone!” Norwich Sunblinds can be contacted on 01603 334047 or book an appointment online for your free home visit. Click here for details of package prices. 

Freebridge Community Housing employees enjoyed their sixth annual Week of Wellbeing last week. The week aims to support the wellbeing of staff across the whole company and involved an array of activities.

Reflexology, creative writing, dance classes and meditation comprised just a small part of the list of events on offer. The week, which took place from 8 – 12 May, is designed to promote and support the six strands of wellbeing – Career, Physical, Mental, Social, Economic and Community Wellbeing – for its employee team of over 200 people.

While many of the week’s events were run by Freebridge employees a host of local organisations and businesses, including The Wellbeing People, Alive Leisure, The Engaging People Company, Paul Tibbs Photography, the Natural Therapy Centre and The Maltings Q Club were amongst those who provided expertise and facilities.

Local businesses generously donated prizes for a charity fundraising raffle. Proceeds will be going to East Anglian Air Ambulance, King’s Lynn Foodbank and West Norfolk RSPCA, who are all Freebridge chosen charities for 2017.

Tony Hall, Chief Executive of Freebridge, said: “Once again we have had a fantastic Week of Wellbeing at Freebridge. This week gives our employees the opportunity to gain news experiences that can have a positive impact on both their work and personal lives.

“Our tenants remain at the heart of everything we do at Freebridge, and we believe that by having a workforce that is both physically and mentally healthy we will be able to continue to provide the best service possible.

“We couldn’t have made the week such a great success without support from local businesses; we would like to express our thanks for all their efforts and generosity.”

Pure will be hosting its second Women’s Leadership Alumni event, bringing together past and present delegates, and their employer sponsors, for a morning of continued development and inspiring guest speakers.

Held at The Jockey Rooms in Newmarket on Wednesday 24 May the event has been organised for previous participants of the Women’s Leadership Programme and anyone interested in finding out more about inclusive leadership.

The Women’s Leadership Programme was first developed in 2014 by professional recruitment specialists Pure, in conjunction with strategic HR consultancy People & Performance. It has already helped more than 65 aspiring female leaders in the Eastern region to strengthen their leadership skills, develop their confidence and to work with their employers to remove any barriers to progression. The second alumni event will be an opportunity for all those involved to come together and to continue discussions on progressing gender equality in businesses of all shapes and sizes.

Lynn Walters, founder and director at Pure, said: “As well as supporting the continued development of aspiring female leaders in our region, this event also provides a great opportunity for them to further develop their professional networks. Our aim is to inspire organisations across the region to create inclusive work environments, where any barriers to progression are removed and everyone can work in a way that makes them feel productive and engaged. We will be joined by guest speakers from the region’s leading organisations who will facilitate discussion and workshops around leadership, culture and strategy.”

The event’s speakers include Dr Andy Wood, Chief Executive at Adnams, David Britain, a strategic HR Consultant who will be leading a workshop on aligning culture and Lynn Morgan, CEO at Arthur Rank Hospice Charity (ARHC) and Donna Talbot, Fundraising Director at the charity.  Donna is a previous programme participant and, with Lynn, will share the story of ARHC raising £10m to build the spectacular new hospice which opened in Cambridge last year.

Limited spaces are still available for employers and aspiring leaders who are interested in finding out more about the programme and who would like to hear from those who have already taken part. All ticket sales will include a donation to the Arthur Rank Hospice and a special discounted ticket is available for not-for-profit and charities.

The next Women’s Leadership Programme will begin in June and a part-funded place is available for an aspiring female leader working at a not-for-profit or smaller enterprise in the region. Sponsored by the Blossom Charity, which supports women in the East of England to be the best they can be, applications for the sponsored place are open to female managers and directors working within social enterprises, not-for-profit organisations, early stage start-ups and SMEs across Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire.

For more information about the Women’s Leadership Programme, attending the alumni event or the sponsored place on the next course, contact Lucy Plumb: lucy.plumb@prs.uk.com

As of Tuesday 9th May, Naked Element are now based at New Patricks Yard, 2 Recorder Road, Norwich, NR1 1NR.   As you may know we’ve recently grown our team, employing a Commercial Director and three new full time developers. As we’ve grown, we’ve needed more equipment and much more space, which was inevitably going to call for our own office.   At New Patricks Yard we have the advantages of our own office, air conditioning, a shower, whiteboard walls and a some funky remote controlled windows. We’re also being looked after by the lovely Sally of Liquid11 (the guys that founded New Patricks Yard).   We’ll still be returning to Whitespace every Thursday morning for our Sandler Sales training in the boardroom, and I’m sure for future events.   Thank you Whitespace for being the base from which Naked Element grew, and to Sarah and Neil for the fab accommodation and help over the years.   The NE Team would love to welcome our clients, suppliers and connections to come and see us at our new office! Please feel free to drop Rain a line at rain@nakedelement.co.uk to arrange a visit.

East-Anglian contract and specialist cleaning services provider, Monthind Clean LLP has appointed Richard Redding as its new Sales Director.

Richard will lead the group’s sales team in generating new business, strengthening relationships with its existing client base across its East Anglia and exploring new markets in Kent and London. He will oversee all sales and marketing activities across the growing business, which includes Monthind Clean, and Cambridge-based Atkins Gregory.

Having spent almost 20 years in the facilities management industry, with the last eleven of those as Commercial Director at Facilicom, Richard brings a wealth of valuable experience to the Monthind group and its client base.

Although this is a new role for Richard, his relationship with Monthind stretches back some years, as he explains. “Monthind’s operations director, Simon Biggs and I worked together for some years at Mowlem’s cleaning division in London. When the opportunity to join Monthind came along and I saw the work culture, and the plans for growth, I decided I wanted to be part of it. The people-first ethos of the company, and the level of loyalty Monthind has from customers and staff says everything about Monthind. I’m delighted to have joined the organisation at such an exciting time.”

Now in its 41st year, Monthind has earned an excellent reputation, and the business has grown organically to exceed a £10 million turnover, with significant growth planned in the next five years. Simon Biggs says, “We’re delighted that Richard has joined us at this stage of our journey. To have him on board with the valuable experience he has, fits well with us, and our plans at this time. Richard’s experience of bidding for various types and sizes of contract and his proven ability in supporting a sales team, I know, will add to Monthind’s reputation of delivering a first class service across the region.”

For more information visit www.monthindclean.co.uk

Tudor Lodge Consultants are pleased to announce that we have recently started works on Tales of Teddy’s website. Tales of Teddy are a blog and luxury dog product website started over the last few years by Samantha Murray Greenway, who has previously worked across national newspapers and publications in the UK.

Initially started as a blog and dog information website, Tales of Teddy has evolved into one of the best-known ‘dog blogs’ on the internet. The products sold include handstitched collars, luxury dog bowls and a wide range of other British made, handcrafted products for dog and the discerning dog owner and lover.

Tales of Teddy approached us with the desire to climb higher up Google for numerous dog-related searches such as ‘schnauzer’ and ‘luxury dog collars.’ With their website already build to a good standard on the WordPress content management system (CMS), Tales of Teddy were in a strong starting position.

What We Are Doing

We started with a comprehensive consultation between ourselves and the client to identify their targets and goals and what they would like to achieve through extensive search engine optimisation (SEO). Through the feedback we received, we were able to provide a list of around 50 keywords that Tales of Teddy want to be found online for via search engines. We then assessed the met data of their website to research how well they are currently performing.

This was done as part of a comprehensive SEO audit that assessed various aspects involving the overall SEO status and online presence of Tales of Teddy. This included their meta data, content, link profile and general site health. It is the results of this audit that have helped shape the plan moving forward for Tales of Teddy.

We have updated their CMS so that it has a range of SEO-friendly plugins and features favoured by Google and other search engines. This ensures that all content and features on the site and everything featured is crawled by search engines in the most efficient manner.

We are also working on updating all of the website’s meta data, content and user experience and will be working to improve the site speed. We look forward to building on our progress and building a thriving partnership between the teams at Tudor Lodge and Tales of Teddy for the future.

Community clear up at Monks Close Community Centre Freebridge Community Housing employees and tenants teamed up on Thursday 4 May for a community clear-up day at the Monks Close Community Centre in Bircham Newton. The clear-up comes in advance of the reopening of the centre for use by the local community and other service providers. Services providers who have already expressed interest in using the facilities include the owner of the adjacent Dreamy Hallow Campsite, Nigel Day, who will be establishing a permanent exhibition in the centre, displaying the historical significance of the local area and its links to the First World War. The community clear-up saw employees from the Freebridge’s Providence Street Placeshaping Team working together with others in the community to help give the Monks Close Centre a facelift after it had lay closed for some months. Robert Clarke, Freebridge Director of Housing, said: “By reinvigorating the Monks Close Community Centre Freebridge are continuing to work towards our vision of supporting a better West Norfolk. “This is a great example of the positive impact our Providence Street Placeshaping Team are achieving in our area. The Providence Street centre has become a hub for supporting and accommodating charities and community groups that work in West Norfolk, and we hope these relationships continue to go from strength to strength.”

We are delighted to announce that Little Havens Hospice are our designated charity for 2017. We will be raising money in a number of events throughout the year.

Little Havens Children’s Hospice who are the only children’s hospice in Essex, opened in 1988 and designed specifically to provide the necessary care and support for children aged 0-19 from Essex and London.  Little Havens take it further than simply caring for the children that need it so much as they also take pride in helping the families of the children that have been diagnosed with a life-limiting illness and provide end of life care, as well as respite breaks for up to 8 weeks of the year.

In order to carry out these truly life-changing services, Little Havens need to raise around £2.5million per year. This is due to receiving very limited government funding and not charging a penny for the care that they provide. So in order to keep their services free of charge and as effective as possible, Little Havens Hospice relies on donations from the community and businesses.

  So the events that we will be involved in and planning are… 

·       19th May – their corporate golf day which we are attending

·       22nd – 26th May – Children’s Hospice Week –  cake sale & raffle

·       1st July – National Three Peaks Challenge

·       19th October – Monthind’s Golf Day

Paris, Amstelveen, 5 May 2017 – Ray Flower has been appointed Head of Technical College of KLM UK Engineering Limited as of 1st March. KLM UK Engineering is a wholly-owned AFI KLM E&M subsidiary specialising in maintenance & training solutions for regional and narrow-body aircraft fleets. Ray Flower started his career in 1979 and has carried out many aviation training roles within the industry over the last 30 years. Ray’s latest roles include Head of Aviation at Kingston University & Chief Academic Officer (CAO) for Al Ain International Aviation Academy (AAIAA) in the UAE, Engineering Head at Qatar Aeronautical College & Head of Aeronautical Engineering at MTC Oman.

On learning of his appointment, Ray Flower said: “I am very proud to be returning to KLM UK Engineering Limited as Head of Technical College. With my previous experience with the Company and the newly acquired knowledge over the last few years in the Middle East I will bring a valuable contribution to both KLMUKE and its students. Being part of the new International Aviation Academy – Norwich and helping to educate and inspire the next generation of aviation engineers is an exciting prospect and I look forward to the challenge ahead, as well as continuing to support the training of our current staff within the MRO’.

We are glad to announce that we are working in close conjunction with the team at Vaccoda Design on the Property Perfect Solutions website. Property Perfect Solutions (PPS) provide a plethora of building and maintenance services across the Kent and South London areas for numerous clients and customers.

PPS was founded by Louise Gallivan, who formed the business and established its principles based on her own experiences with builders and tradespeople over the years. Louise continues to recognise the importance of receiving not just an acceptable service, but a service that surpasses expectations. As such, the business has grown over the last few years with many satisfied clients.

The natural step for PPS has therefore been to expand their offerings online. This has involved a few steps and working with the talented team at Vaccoda Design PPS has already seen great results. However, in order to further progress their website and offerings through online marketing channels we have implanted various best practices and continue to improve their online presence.

What Has Already Been Done for PPS

Vaccoda have already helped PPS receive a top notch and high performing website that is built for purpose. With sections for specific offerings and user journeys through the site made very clear, the site is easily crawled [ranked] by Google and other search engines. In addition, the design of the site has been constructed to a very high standard, indicating a level of professionalism to users.

The SEO

We have carried out many SEO best practices to get PPS well on track to the best positions possible online. We carried out extensive keyword research based on PPS’ feedback and input. This has ensured that all SEO work from the very start is targeted, focused and relevant. Many sites find themselves ranking for terms and searches that they never wished to target, making their site less relevant to some users.

However, through the thorough keyword research, we are targeting very specific searches such as ‘property maintenance in Kent’ and other related services offered by the PPS team.

We have also provided PPS’ website with bespoke meta data; titles and descriptions across their entire site. This makes sure that Google and other search engines can read the site and individual pages in the most efficient and accurate way possible. These meta data updates have been done with the keyword research in mind to make sure specific pages target specific searches.

We have also started adding bespoke landing pages to the site, based on our keyword research and PPS’ feedback. These pages are designed to ‘capture’ users and those searching for the relevant service in PPS’ case. Additionally, we are continuing to monitor the site’s sitemap to make sure that all pages are included; being provided easily to Google read and rank accordingly.

We also continue to update any broken links on the site that will impact the speed and code structure of the website and we have already fixed several broken links to good effect.

We continue to provide additional, fully optimised content to PPS for their website and continue to identify new areas of expansion online through ongoing keyword research. We look forward to building on the solid SEO foundations we are laying and are looking forward to a successful and fruitful partnership with all the team at PPS.

Genix to Launch Norwich Coffee Means Business Genix, Norfolk’s business support organisation will launch its networking event, Coffee Means Business at The Space, Norwich on Tuesday 16 May. Genix’s informal and friendly networking format has been a hit in North Norfolk, over 40 people attended their April event at Holkham Studios. Leanne Castle of Genix, said, “Many businesses have asked us when we’d launch another Coffee Means Business, this time in The City. The events are designed to be a little different to the usual business networking and this month we have invited broadcaster, Nick Pandolfi to give his top tips on making social media your marketing friend. Genix Patron, Andrew Winship of i101 Digital will show how good imagery enhances business sales. “I think Coffee Means Business are so popular because we don’t charge joining or membership fees, just £2 per person, payable on arrival, due to the generous support of Genix Patron, Larking Gowen Chartered Accountants. Sharyn Scott of Larking Gowen commented, “We are delighted to support these events. We know that networking can be time-consuming and costly for smaller and start-up businesses. The Genix sessions create a great opportunity for business owners to meet other like-minded individuals as well as connecting with professional service providers, such as Larking Gowen, which can be invaluable both for making future connections and utilising their network, as well as learning how others have tackled issues they might be facing for the first time” Coffee Means Business will take place at The Space, Norwich NR7 8SQ on Tuesday 16th May and again on Tuesday 20th June, from 9.30am until 11.30am, booking isn’t essential and more details can be found at www.genix.org.uk.

Thomson & First Choice today launched the first flight to Rhodes for Norwich airport for anyone taking a holiday to the destination for summer 2017. Holidaymakers from Norwich will now be able to soak up the sunshine on the popular island of Rhodes, with its beautiful beaches, historical sites and party hot spots. The decision to introduce new routes is part of the holiday company’s plans to ensure customers across the UK can fly from their local airport and stay at the best hotels in some of the most enticing destinations. Hailed as the most popular Greek Island, residents from East Anglia will now have the chance to visit some of Thomson and First Choice’s most popular flagship hotels in Rhodes, including Thomson’s 5T Sensimar Imperial Resort & Spa by Atlantica. The adults only hotel sits right next the beach and has a huge lagoon pool surrounded by sunbeds and parasols. With summer 2018 holidays now on sale, holidaymakers from Norwich will also be able to stay next year at the brand new 5T TUI SENSATORI Resort Rhodes by Atlantica, the newest addition to the TUI Sensatori portfolio, offering a luxury spa, swim up bar and a variety of themed a la carte restaurants. Karen Switzer, Director of Aviation Planning for TUI UK & Ireland, said: “Introducing the new route to Rhodes is a key part of our strategy to enhance the holiday experience for our customers from Norwich and give them wider access to our exciting collection of destinations.” Richard Pace Managing Director of Norwich Airport said: “We are delighted that Thomson and First Choice have launched a new route to Rhodes. It demonstrates the holiday company’s commitment to the airport and provides even more choice to local people.”