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Keep Trade Local in Bracknell is NO BULL !! |
In the picture left to right – Deputy Mayoress of the Borough of Bracknell Forest Enid Leake, Deputy Mayor of the Borough of Bracknell Forest Cllr Ian Leake, Cllr Chas Baily Bracknell Town Mayor, Richard Knight FSB East Berkshire Vice chairman, Neil Ellis – Owner of Bull Public House
The FSB (Federation of Small businesses) has been running a national campaign for sometime called “Keep Trade Local”. This has had an immense amount of coverage nationally and each regional committee of the FSB around the UK have been doing their own campaigns at a local level. The East Berkshire committee have been working hard in the region they cover from Slough to Wokingham and have run and are running several Keep Trade Local events and campaigns. Richard Knight, business owner and Bracknell resident decided to take on the Bracknell campaign with help from other committee members, small business owners and Bracknell residents, Margaret Corridan and John Cassidy. It was decided that the Keep Trade Local campaign could work very well in Bracknell and to integrate it with a networking event with a difference – one where they could get local Bracknell businesses from the retail sector and from the commercial sector to meet at a Bracknell venue at a time that would suit most people. The purpose of the event was to encourage Bracknell businesses to do business with other Bracknell business. The Bull was selected and Neil Ellis was happy to oblige. The FSB sponsored the buffet and the date and time was set – 6pm to 8pm on 21 Jan, so people could pop in straight from work. As always with a new event, there was a certain amount of excitement and also trepidation. People started arriving soon after 5.30, when they shut up shop for the evening. Already by the start time of 6pm, there were over 20 people in attendance getting to know each other and building relationships with other Bracknell businesses. By 6.30 the room was buzzing and there were over 40 businesses in attendance. 13 had seen the advert in the local press and had just dropped in so this was also really encouraging. The event had really caused a bit of a buzz in Bracknell which proves how beneficial an event like this can be for the businesses people of the Bracknell Forest area. Cllr Ian Leake (The deputy mayor of the Borough of Bracknell Forest) and his lovely lady wife Enid attended the event along with Cllr Chas Baily (Bracknell Town Mayor) and Cllr Mary Ballin. Their attendance and support was greatly appreciated by the FSB and all who attended. Cllr Leake was kind enough to address the businesses and gave a brief talk on how important it is for local businesses to support each other especially through these difficult economic times. Cllr Baily endorsed these comments. Richard Knight said, “It was really encouraging that so many people were still building relationships come 8pm, with the event finally wound up around 8.30. There were some very positive comments and the support of the event is proof to me that this is badly needed in Bracknell. This was the first of its kind and there will be more to follow. We are just organizing another date and this will be publicised in the press as soon as the dates are known. I would like to personally thank all those who attended, the positive comments we received and I can assure you this is the start of creating a real buzz in Bracknell. The only thing I would like to say is that it would be fantastic if we can get more businesses from the retail sector at the next event. I am sure those who did attend will let other businesses know and lets hope this can grow to bigger and better things for the businesses in Bracknell” FSB East Berkshire Richard Knight Focal Point Advertising The Bull in Bracknell |
