Successful bootcamp for budding entrepreneurs

People with an enterprising business idea had a unique opportunity to develop their entrepreneurial skills during Aberystwyth University’s annual Business Start-Up Week. 

Taking place from 3-7 June 2019, attendees benefitted from a range of free business skills workshops designed around the key issues which face a start-up business or social enterprise. 

This year’s Business Start-up Week programme included sessions on market research, marketing and branding, costing and pricing, digital marketing, financial planning and control, tax, intellectual property and legal issues.  

The schedule also included presentations by role models who have started successful businesses. 

The University’s Enterprise Manager, Tony Orme, who has organised Business Start-up Week at the University for over a decade, explains:  “As usual, this year’s Business Start-up Week offered a great opportunity for anybody who has ever dreamed of starting their own business to learn the skills they need to help make their business idea a reality. 

“The week provided attendees with tips and practical guidance from business advisors and University staff, and the chance to hear first-hand from inspirational successful entrepreneurs.

“This year’s attendees heard from two business role models: Melissa Warren, a textile artist from Rhondda Cynon Taf, who studied textiles at college and wanted to carry on the innovative work she was doing. She started out at home with one domestic and one industrial knitting machine, and now has 22 machines plus sewing machines and embellishers.  The second, Ryan Stephens, started his first company when he was 19 and has opened several others since then. He currently owns AVARUS, an online fashion marketplace with over 3,500 products.”

Business Start-Up Week is a partnership between Aberystwyth University’s Student Support and Careers Service and the Welsh Government’s Big Ideas Wales.

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