The perfect partners by help from Serena Allen. Business Adviser, Social Business Wales.
Nought to 60 in 6 months
Chris Brookfield, a highly talented and experienced media professional, has holidayed in the popular seaside resort of Tenby, Pembrokeshire, for over forty years. The new Around Tenby website started off as a passion project for Chris to help friends and family visiting the area. It is now fast becoming a highly scale-able web platform for Wales and the tourist and business community.
After the initial soft launch in Tenby, it didn’t take long before ‘The Around Tenby’ platform had the attention of several of the town’s business organisations, council members, and local businesses. All wanting to know and understand more about the beautifully crafted website that represented Tenby in a way the town had never seen before. Modern, futureproofed, professionally designed, with professionally created content.
Chris Brookfield’s website had everyone’s attention. He had inadvertently created a solution to a problem, not only for Tenby but as it transpired, the whole of Wales’s tourism destinations.
Realising the size of the opportunity and the potential to the local area, phone calls were made for business support, and the Around Tenby team were introduced to myself (Serena Allen), Business Advisor for Social Business Wales.
Like those in Tenby, I realised the size and potential of the opportunity and supported the Around Tenby Team to steer what was a passion project to become a social business, a Community Interest Company (CIC) registered in Tenby.
With structure and a clearer path ahead, we linked the Around Tenby team with specialist peer mentors to help create a business plan and a commercialisation strategy that would enable the original Around Tenby platform to scale and expand throughout Wales.
Peer mentors/business consultants Jeremy Bowen-Rees and Karlis Ozolins are now bringing their expert advice to the Around Tenby team with support from Social Business Wales. They are now well on their way to replicating what has been achieved in Tenby, to grow into ‘The Around Project’ for other areas of Wales.
