Shropshire's young entrepreneurs get a taste of retail at the Darwin Centre
Young entrepreneurs showed off their business ideas and pitched for sales at a Young Enterprise Fair at Shrewsbury’s Darwin Shopping Centre.
And with 29 newly formed companies battling it out for a place in the national Young Enterprise final, competition was red-hot among the teenage business leaders of the future who were taking part.
The competition is organised by Young Enterprise, an education and business charity that runs a raft of programmes designed to give young people a taste of the business world.
Young Enterprise manager Tim Baker says the programme is now in its 50th year and the standard rises each and every year.
He said: “The work we see and the professionalism of the students never ceases to amaze me. The entrepreneurial spirit is definitely alive and well in Shropshire, no doubt about that!
“I think TV shows such as The Apprentice, Young Apprentice and Dragon’s Den have all helped raise awareness of the world of business to young people and that has to be a positive thing.
“A great many of the business leaders we see leading major companies today are former participants in the Young Enterprise scheme and each year we see the number of young people taking part going up and up.”
Kevin Lockwood, Manager of the Darwin, Pride Hill and Riverside Shopping Centres, said: “It was great to see so many schools represented at the Young Enterprise event and we were really pleased to have them here again.
“Hopefully this event will give these young people a grounding in and taste for working in the retail sector as well as the experience of actually having to go out and sell to the public.”
One of the teams taking part in the Young Enterprise Fair at the Darwin Centre was Capital Accessories, a company made up of students of Idsall School, Shifnal.
Student Tom Crothall, 14, who took on the role of the team’s Sales Manager, explained how Capital Accessories had come up with the idea of using suitcases into retro music players.
He said: “We had various meetings and thrashed out some ideas. We decided retro was big and that’s what we wanted to base our product on. We came up with the idea of using small old suitcases to turn into music players.
“We had some guidance from our design teacher who helped us put together a prototype. We now have a case with speakers and an docking port installed that will play music from iPlayers or smart phones.
“The other products we are selling we arranged by approaching a supplier and making a deal whereby we only pay for what we sell and at a fixed price meaning we are able to include a profit margin.
“The whole scheme has been a very positive experience and we have all really enjoyed it. We have tried to be different and hopefully our retro theme will work.”
The Blue Gecko team from The Marches School, Oswestry, came up with the idea of turning waste wood into bird feeders and boxes.
Alex Keir, 15, says the team came up with the company name by chance.
He said: “To be honest we were randomly looking at words that went together well and chose Blue Gecko as it’s quite funky and a bit different. We think it really stands out.
“We have made some bird feeders ourselves as well as buying in bird seed and then measuring it out into presentation bags. We are really enjoying the Fair and have made quite a few sales already. It’s really working well.”
The E-Go team is made up of a group of home educated students who got together through Otherwise Engaged, a Shropshire charity offering information and support to home educating families.
The company’s IT Director, Elliott Edwards, 16, of Bridgnorth, says some team members had never met before starting the process.
He said: “We came together to enter a team through Otherwise Engaged so are only just learning about each other. We had dozens of ideas on what products to make and sell. However, we eventually settled on beeswax candles and other beeswax products.
“We are also developing a computer game. It’s an arcade-type game in which the player controls a set of traffic lights. The key is to ensure you change the lights to ensure traffic flows smoothly.
“If you fail, traffic queues build up and road rage can develop while the amount of traffic increases the further you get into the game. Team member, Miren Kemp, our marketing manager, came up with the concept and I wrote some of the programme. The idea is now with a game developer.”
Team member, Sophie Hatt, 15, of Wigmore, added: “We are also now doing workshops in some Shropshire primary schools where we talk about the importance of the bee industry and show pupils how to make their own beeswax candles.
“We feel this is an important part of our company’s green ethos. We would obviously love to win the overall challenge and will be putting every effort into our E-Go company in the weeks ahead.”
Shrewsbury High School pupils put together a company called Luna which recycles glass bottles and jars into decorative painted candle holders.
Laura Bason, 17, says the team got together and discussed at length what their product should be before finally deciding on glass candle holders.
She said: “We put a design team together and then worked out the cost of the glass paint, wire holders and candles. It’s been a really good experience and teaches you a lot about business.
“We have all taking on specific roles to ensure the company is run on the right lines. We believe in our product which is green, eco-friendly and uses material people would ordinarily simply throw away.”
