Croydon Enterprise
Croydon Enterprise was the London regional winner of the Enterprising Britain 2007 Awards for London. It was also highly commended by the judging panel in the national finals.
Croydon has been recognised for its success in setting up the Croydon Enterprise programme, which provides advice and support to budding entrepreneurs, as well as helping existing businesses to grow and develop.Although Croydon has a thriving town centre it also has significant pockets of deprivation, with low levels of enterprise; high unemployment; high numbers of young people not in education or work; and one of the lowest self-employment rates in London. The key challenge for Croydon, London’s largest borough, has been to close the gap between its thriving areas and its more deprived districts.
In 2005 the local council took the innovative step of tackling these issues by working with a private organisation, Croydon Business Ltd, to bid for funding and then to manage a new programme of business support. Croydon was successful in securing £77million over 10 years from the Government’s Local Enterprise Growth Initiative (LEGI) funding to help regenerate its communities. Croydon Enterprise, administered by Croydon Council, commissioned delivery partners from the business, public and voluntary sectors to deliver services within the programme. The initiative will receive £20.3m funding in the first three years and expects to double this through support from other partners.
There are three main areas Croydon Enterprise focusses on. Firstly, encouraging and supporting budding entrepreneurs; secondly, supporting existing businesses and reducing business failure and lastly, attracting new business, inward investment, and local employment opportunities. The project is aimed at local businesses who have never had support to grow, as well as people who have never engaged in enterprise, including young people, teenage parents, women, lone parents, people with disabilities, BAME communities and over-50s.
In order to do this, Croydon Enterprise offers business advice and support, at every stage of an aspiring entrepreneur’s journey including a business friendly planning service, which provides free advice to help businesses start and grow. Also on offer is a free premises brokerage service, as well as activities showing people how a franchise can get them started and how licensing their idea can help them grow. Another project provides free help to encourage potential and existing businesses to think innovatively about their idea or how their business can grow. As part of the programme, entrepreneurs are able to access innovative support through outreach work, district centre managers, a dedicated website and a business advice hotline.
In 12 months the project has developed a strong identity, offering targeted support and training, and helping local people become community entrepreneurs. In summary, a building enterprise construction skills centre is now up and running; over 3,000 people are considering starting a business; over 1,000 new businesses have been started up, and hundreds of calls have been made to the new business hotline.
In addition, more than 1,000 people have now taken part in enterprise workshops and they have already seen results. Such as James Vince, 22, who after attending a ‘start your own business workshop’ launched his own company, producing websites for advertising agencies. James says, “The Croydon Enterprise workshop came and removed the barriers. In six weeks I have gone from being unemployed, to having a registered company and trading.”
An international trade and new markets project is also helping to boost the local economy. Overseas trips to encourage bidding for foreign contracts have been organized to South Africa, Poland, Holland and the Czech Republic as part of Croydon’s export drive. There have already been some successes including Arista Cosmetics that secured a deal with two Czech companies and packaging company Compgen that are bidding for a £1m contract with a firm in South Africa.
Finally, Croydon Enterprise has helped make local businesses safer, by investing £116,000 to reduce crime that affects business. This includes wireless CCTV and security equipment, following a police check, and comes as a result of a survey of 4,000 businesses.
In terms of the future, there are impressive and ambitious plans for Croydon including £2 billion of new redevelopment in the pipeline for the town centre. Croydon Enterprise has now agreed the go-ahead for the first Enterprise Opportunity Centre, with three others to follow. This first centre will be in New Addington and is a key part of a £75 million new development built with funding from Tesco, which will offer affordable start-ups business units, on-site support, and educational initiatives.
Jeremy Long, LDA Board Member, Chair of the Business Engagement & Skills Committee and CEO of European Business, MTR Corporation, said:
“Croydon Enterprise is an outstanding example of how a locally focussed organisation can make a real difference.”