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Social enterprise experts set sail for North Tyneside

Budding entrepreneurs in and around North Tyneside are being offered help to turn their dreams into reality thanks to the saving of a social enterprise lifeline.

The Mission, in Lower Rudyerd Street, North Shields, has been a base for social enterprises (employee-owned and run businesses) for a number of years, but its future hung in the balance after previous owners Comecon went into voluntary liquidation.

But regional start-up experts SES have bought the building and now intend to create a hub for businesses of all sizes to work in.

Development manager at The Mission, Lynne Craggs, who is a woman’s enterprise ambassador for One NorthEast, said that the building would become an incubator unit to nurture new businesses and support them as they grow.

Lynne said: “The main focus at the Mission will be on social enterprises but we are also keen to help business start-ups too, especially women. In fact if you have an idea or simply a dream of what you want to do, we can help to take that forward.

“We are here to help businesses long term and if the help people requires strays out of our expertise, we can signpost them to the relevant people.”

Sunderland-based SES has assisted 66 social enterprises (run for social and community benefit) during its last financial year, which together have a combined turnover of more than £12.8 million and employ around 750 people.

SES director Mark Heskett-Saddington said: “The Mission is a marvelous facility which offers a base for social businesses to develop. The Mission will offer a whole range of services and support which are vital to help people take those first steps into business and then to thrive and grow. “There is a range of facilities on offer from fully-serviced contemporary offices for growing businesses to hot desks, where someone rents a desk and a computer.”

Anyone wishing to find out more about social enterprises can contact Lynne Craggs at The Mission on 0191 2728571.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .