Chamber News

The United Kingdom will leave the European Union on the 31 October 2019 and your business will need to take action to get ready.

Join a free Brexit Business Readiness Event in your area to meet government advisers and to find out what actions your business needs to take to prepare.

The events will combine a keynote address, interactive support, advice stands and in-depth sessions led by subject matter experts. They will provide you with specific business-focused advice and help.

Events will be taking place across the UK and new locations will be added to this website as they’re confirmed.

https://registration.livegroup.co.uk/brexitbusinessreadinessevents/

The Government is accelerating Brexit preparations so that it is ready to leave the EU on 31st October. Join the Department for International Trade in the East of England for a lunch session to discuss how to best prepare your business for Brexit.

During the session you will hear from Jim Fanshawe from Your Export Department, who has a wealth of international experience working for UK Trade & Investment and other commercial organisations, and have the opportunity to speak with local partners during the networking lunch.

What will you learn?

You’ll leave the event with information on how to create a personalised action plan covering:

• paperwork needed to continue exporting
• impact to supply chains
• changes to regulations and contracts
• where to find tariff information, commodity codes and duty rates
• what you might need to speak to customers and employees about
• moving goods across borders
• business travel to the EU
• providing services to EU clients
• how to treat personal data

Who is this event for?

All exporters, particularly those exporting to the EU. There are several events like this running across the country. Please visit the main page to see the full list of events.

Please note places are limited to 2 delegates per company across the whole series of events and offered on a first come, first serve basis.

This year’s Talking Tech on 18th September, one of Norfolk Chambers flagship events, got off to a great start with over 160 business professionals attending at The Space, Norwich. We hosted 18 expert speakers who shared their, knowledge, experience, and key tips on the theme of ‘Myth Busting’ within the tech industry.

The conference was a platform to share; cost-effective, new innovative concepts, business initiatives, and current issues facing the business community with technology. As well as, dispelling the myths behind technology held in the workplace. The morning offered constructive solutions for all of us to take back to our teams and businesses.  

Throughout the whole conference, Rebecca Osbourne document all the speakers with her fantastic live event graphic recording.

Tom Broome, Creative Director from Creative Quills, kicked off the event and was the first speaker of the morning. Tom highlighted some great points on how to use marketing to make ‘making the technical accessible.’ He emphasised how important it is to pitch your marketing message at the right level; when to use video, infographics, written content, and photography. All helping to strengthen your brand for the viewer, and client.

Juliana Meyer, founder and CEO of SupaPass followed with a glimpse into the key future trends that are emerging and happening online, and how as businesses, we can take control of our content, and data. She also discussed how we are consuming information; such the rise of the podcasts, which is up by 36%. Juliana also shared the four key digital trends surfacing, all of which are often consumed on our mobile phones through; apps-subscriptions, video consumption, subscriptions (which is a growing trend and not to be ignored), and podcasts.

Up next our Cyber Security panel including Kitty Rosser, Birketts LLP, Peter Cubbins, Cyberfen, Tash Hales, Ladies Hacking Society, discussed several questions from the audience. One of the first questions was ‘the idea it won’t be me as a data target.’ The panel gave several ways to tackle this issue of a data breach, for businesses of all scales, and an individual level too. One key point we should take from the panel discussion was; it is good to share these experiences if it happens to your business and to report the issue too. It is also important to consider training staff in clear procedures, as this can be a valuable use of time, investment, and help to reduce future breaches.

Paul Maskell, Dardan Security, then took us on a journey about our relationship and interaction with technology. Paul highlighted ways in which we can maintain a healthy sense of wellbeing with technology, how we can approach our daily narratives with tech in the workplace and our personal life’s. Paul, gave some very positive solutions for us all to find a happy equilibrium.

Taking the stage ahead of our break was Jim Palmer, Head of Digital, at Netmatters Ltd. Jim gave an interesting insight into the eight-year-long journey of how his company, have transformed their business to become paperless! (Yes, that’s no paper!) He gave several very useful tips of how to take the changes into our businesses, such as digital ‘to-do lists’ a clear inbox policy, dual screens, writing on digital tablets, dual-screen and requesting all invoices to be emailed- not a hard copy or posted.

Following the break Bradley Lawernce, Head of Sales at UBISEND, discussed the role chatbots have within our businesses, customer experience, how we use them, the business cases and myths surrounding the chatbot.

Brandley then joined our AI Panel (Artificial intelligence) – the second panel of the morning, to discuss the opportunities for small businesses to be using AI. James Russell, Co-founder and CEO, Brisk, Linford Bacon, Data Scientist and Senior manager at Aviva,  Bradley Lawernce, Head of Sales at UBISEND, ( https://www.ubisend.com/ ) all shared several ways we can successfully use these technologies, with governance.

With the continuing developments of technology within Farming, Fiona Rust from Agri-Tech East then came on stage and demonstrated the innovation within this sector, the importance of engagement with the younger generation, and how the industry is tackling issues with a growing population.  

When talking about the Games Industry there are often some misconceptions, however, Robin Milton, from Access Creative College and Norfolk Game developers gave a clear picture of how this industry is thriving and used within our everyday life’s. Do you know the UK is the 6th largest video game market, with a spend of £5.7bn in 2018 (Ukie), Wow!

The last keynote speaker of the morning was Kris Jones, CEO of Tech Velocity Ltd, who talked about ‘Plastic innovation’ and looked at how we can re-imagine ways in which you can be more ‘innovative’ in business in a true manner, helping build continues success. 

Lightening talks– with only 3 minutes to talk about their topics focused on meetup and networking groups. Paul Grenyer, Naked Element kicked off the first talk about nor(DEV): who run events throughout the year, to support software development professionals, developers, and software business owners. Next up was Tom Haczewski, from The User Story, who talked about Hot Source a meetup group for ‘forward-thinking creatives.’ Co-organiser of Sync Norwich Sean Clark of Clark St James then took the stage. Sync Norwich is Norwich’s tech and start up community supporting and enabling tech business growth through a series of events, including Sync the City which is a 54 hour start up event taking place annually. Last up was Mark Williams-Cook from Candour, talking about Search Norwich this is a meetup for anyone interested in search marketing. All of these group offer a great opportunity for networking and building community in Norfolk.

The groups then remained on stage together to take part in a panel discussion focusing on the tech community of Norfolk. The main takeaway was the group encouraging all businesses, not just tech focused organisations, to come along to their groups to get involved in the thriving community we have in Norfolk.

After lunch, Mark Williams-Cook from Candour, ran a workshop focused on ‘why your website content is rubbish and you don’t rack in Google.’ Mark gave a practical survival for the audience to take away. This was the last speaker of the day and brought the event to a close.

A big thank you to our sponsors, without their support events like Talking Tech would not be possible. Thanks to Barclays Digital Eagles, Breakwater IT and Naked Element.

A big thanks to our exhibitor too; Breakwater IT, Naked Element, 101, Bigfork, CSS Cloud, Develop EBP, EIRA, Empresa, Omnis Software and VMIT.

Thanks to everyone who attended too, we look forward to 2020 Talking Tech!

Today, two prominent businesses in Norfolk have been recognised as the East of England Regional Winners for the prestigious British Chambers of Commerce Business Awards 2019.

The annual Chamber Business Awards have entries from businesses across UK. And we are delighted to announce that two Norfolk Chambers of Commerce members, Gnaw Chocolate and Indigo Swan have been selected as winners for this region. The East of England region covers Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Essex.

Chris Sargisson, Chief Executive of Norfolk Chambers of Commerce said:

“This is a great achievement for the winning companies and reflects the innovative and progressive nature of our members, their staff, and their businesses. It is clear that Norfolk is a thriving area to work and run a business.”

For the second year in a row, Gnaw Chocolate, the luxury chocolate brand has been crowned this years’ regional Export Business of the Year award.  Gnaw, now, an internationally renowned brand is going from strength to strength, with several awards under their belt.  Last year they scooped the National Chamber Business Awards for ‘Small Business of the Year 2018’ but were runners-up for the National Export of the Year award.   

Commenting on his regional win, Matt Legon, Director at Gnaw Chocolate said:

“We’re absolutely delighted to win the regional Export Business of the year! I think many businesses will agree that the past 12 months have presented some unique challenges and that we’ve managed to work through these and keep moving forwards is testament to the brand and the team of eighteen that we’ve built here at Gnaw.”

The winners of regional Workplace Wellbeing Award, Indigo Swan, the Independent energy consultants based in Norwich, clearly put staff and client wellbeing at the forefront of their business, the recognition of this demonstrates a very forward-thinking business. The company currently employs twenty one staff.

James Groves, Managing Director at Indigo Swan said:

“Wellbeing in the workplace has always been of the upmost importance to all of us at Indigo Swan. With ‘Happiness First’ as one of our core values it is imperative that we give the team a safe habitat to be themselves and to be able to be open and honest about their wellbeing on a daily basis. The wellbeing fund, Ron’s Runners and our Pilates group are just some of the ways we are taking wellbeing seriously but making it fun at the same time. We are extremely proud to be recognised by the Norfolk Chamber as a shining light in our area for workplace wellbeing and we will continue to put it right at the very top of the agenda.”

All regional winners are now finalists for the National Awards and are invited Chamber Business Awards Gala Dinner in London on Friday 28th November 2019 where the National winners will be announced. They will also have the chance to win Business of Year and be battling for the prestigious national finalist categories against all the UK Chambers.

The British Chambers of Commerce today publishes an evaluation of official UK Government guidance to businesses on critical operational issues in the event of an unwanted ‘no deal’ exit on 31st October.  

The leading business group has found that, at the time of publication, 31 of 36 business-critical areas are still marked amber or red, indicating that firms have incomplete or insufficient information available to plan thoroughly for a ‘no deal’ outcome.   

The BCC does not believe that the impact of a messy and disorderly exit can be fully mitigated. Some of the key questions facing businesses depend on negotiation or some level of coordination between the UK and the EU. However, wherever possible, businesses need government guidance that is visible, clear, complete, timely and actionable to address key risks and prepare as much as possible for all scenarios.   

With just weeks until the October 31st deadline, of the 36 questions most frequently raised by companies, the leading business group’s assessment is that:

• 5 are marked green – the top rating for available information based on our quality criteria;
• 21 are amber – indicating that some information is available, but there are gaps and/or other quality issues still to be addressed;
• 10 are red – indicating little or no concrete information is available to help businesses to plan.

While government has noticeably ramped up the volume of communication, advice and engagement around a possible ‘no deal’ scenario in recent weeks, significant improvements are still needed to the level of detail and specificity in order to assist business contingency planning. The BCC continues to meet with government to discuss business readiness and government has committed to work with the business group to address the issues raised in the evaluation. As new and improved information becomes publicly available, the dashboard will be updated. 

On issues such as the UK successor to the EU Structural Funds, access to an official UK market access database on tariff levels, rules relating to staff transfers between the UK and EU, and cross-border trade between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, there is no clear information on which firms can base their future plans. 

 The research is not an assessment of the economic impact of a no-deal exit, or a judgement on the desirability of the policy change in each case. Instead, it is intended to evaluate whether official guidance is clear enough for business decision-making and forward planning. 

 Dr Adam Marshall, Director General of the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), said:  

“While the government has ramped up communication to businesses in recent weeks, there are still big gaps in the guidance available to help businesses to prepare for Brexit, with just weeks to go until October 31st.  

“Our business communities don’t want to see a disorderly ‘no deal’ exit on October 31st, which would lead to an overnight change in trading conditions. The guidance, information and advice available to businesses is not specific enough to enable firms to plan for an abrupt change. 

“Averting a messy and disorderly exit is still critical. Businesses across the UK want politicians on all sides to come together and find a way forward – fast.”

We are pleased to announce the Birketts LLP have signed up as a Bronze sponsor for The B2B Exhibition 2019. 

Birketts is a full service, top 100 UK law firm, based in the East of England, with offices in Cambridge, Chelmsford, Ipswich and Norwich.

With a rich heritage spanning over 150 years they’ve built an enviable track record advising businesses, institutions and individuals in the UK and internationally.

While Birketts operate from four offices across East Anglia providing a wide range of services, the firm shares a common culture and approach to service delivery. Over 670 people are engaged in the business and their lawyers and support staff all have a shared commitment to deliver the best possible outcome for their clients.

They are large enough to provide specialist expertise in most areas of the law at a standard that is frequently compared with major City firms, but not at the expense of maintaining a personal and tailored service. Birketts are flexible about everything except their reputation for maintaining the highest professional and ethical standards.

Birketts LLP will be on stand 29b at The B2B Exhibition 2019, which takes place on Thursday 17 October, 10am – 4pm at it’s new venue; Norfolk Showground.

The B2B Exhibition is free to all businesses to attend and limited exhibition stands are available. 

For more information on the event please click here. 

Review your company’s approach to pro-active international business development”

The Department for International Trade are offering a free review that looks at a company’s approach to pro-active international business development, the tool “Growth Mapper” software will be able to help with this specific review as it is designed to analyse the exporting capabilities perception of a company by its own executives and direct discussions to specific areas. It consists of a short 10-12 minute online questionnaire to each executive that the software will process. In essence it reviews whether everyone in the company is singing from the same hymn sheet and usually leads to a strategic orientated discussion. Specifically designed for companies where at least three staff within the company are involved in international business.

The benefits:

• Enables your Growth Mapper adviser to quickly establish a picture of your business.
• Allows you to judge your business’ current readiness for export or export growth.
• Provides a catalyst for an export strategy focused on profitable growth.
• Identifies issues in your business that are holding you back.
• Output report helps identify priority areas of support from DIT and trusted partners.

Interested?

Get in contact with the Department for International Trade in the East of England today:

eastinfo@mobile.trade.gov.uk

+44 (0) 1707 398 398

The Spanish Chamber of Commerce in the United Kingdom‘s goal is to create the best platform to provide professional opportunities within the British-Spanish business network, as well as to offer advice and experience to either SMEs or multinationals: our pursuit is to find tailor-made solutions for the particular requirements of each company.

Under this principle was our institution founded in 1886 as an association freely established in London by Spanish and British merchants, industrialists and other professionals, with the aim to build stronger economic and commercial relationships between both countries.

Keeping this belief in mind as our main goal, the Spanish Chamber offers a wide range of services to provide the best commercial promotion opportunities, while our events are the chance to expand your professional contact network.

Answering to the special needs of each company, we offer different trade services, to adapt to the request of the contracting business.

As a first step we offer market reports, which delve into the markets, helping the contracting company to understand the features of their field, as well as the paths and barriers, the potential customers and competitors.

Following this, we also provide commercial presentations, a service that has the objective to provide an overview of the market, by presenting the products offered by the contracting business to potential customer and partner companies.

We also arrange commercial agendas with the purpose to establish face to face meetings with companies whose activities are of interest to our contracting business.

One of our most successful commercial activities are the Inward and Outward Trade Missions. With the aim to increase the imports and exports of local products, we collaborate with other institutions such as local chambers of commerce, regional promotion companies and business groups in the organisation of visits to companies who want to present their products and are looking for commercial collaborators.

In the first nine months of 2019 we have already arranged seven commercial presentations and agendas to companies covering the variety of sectors from the food industry to BIM engineering or consultancy services.

We’ve also organised two trade missions to the Canary Islands and Castilla – La Mancha, and we are already coordinating the next one, taking place in Galicia in October. Having said that, we would like to introduce ourselves as an organisation that has been helping both UK and Spanish businesses since 1886.

The British Chambers of Commerce has today (Monday) released its latest economic forecast, downgrading growth expectations for the UK in 2019 to 1.2% (from 1.3%) and to 0.8% (from 1.0%) for 2020. Our GDP growth forecast of 1.2% remains unchanged for 2021.

While the leading business group expects that the UK economy will avoid a technical recession and return to modest growth in the third quarter, downgrades to its GDP growth forecast for 2019 and 2020 reflect a weaker outlook for investment, trade and productivity amid a continued lack of clarity over the outcome of Brexit and deteriorating global economic conditions.

Business investment is now forecast to decline by 1.5% this year and by 0.1% in 2020, which together with the decline of 0.4% in 2018, would be the longest period of sustained full-year declines in business investment for 17 years. Relentless Brexit uncertainty and the diversion of resources by many businesses to guard against the chaos of a messy and disorderly Brexit, are expected to limit investment intentions over the forecast period.

UK productivity is projected to be more subdued than in our previous outlook and implies that by the end of 2020, the UK economy will have experienced its weakest decade of average annual productivity growth on record. Anaemic business investment, together with low unemployment, is expected to keep a lid on productivity, with firms expected to rely more on hoarding labour than investing in new technology given the heightened political and economic uncertainty. 

The UK’s net trade position is forecast to weaken over the period as companies face the combined headwinds of relentless uncertainty on the UK’s future relationship with Europe, weakening growth in key international markets and mounting global trade tensions.

The BCC’s economic forecast assumes a messy and disorderly Brexit is avoided. A no-deal exit would lead to major, sudden and unanticipated changes for the UK economy and would lead to revisions in our next forecast.

The persistently listless growth forecast reflects the impact of a slowing global economy and increasing trade tensions, but is also a stark reminder of the impact of the political turmoil and lingering unwanted prospect of no-deal exit – the economic consequences of which would be extensive. The BCC is therefore calling on government to do everything in its power to come to a negotiated solution with the EU and to take urgent steps to incentivise investment and boost business confidence.

Commenting on the forecast, Suren Thiru, Head of Economics at the British Chambers of Commerce, said:

“Our latest outlook indicates that the UK economy is set to stumble down an ever more sluggish growth path over the near term, unless decisive action is taken.

“The prolonged nature of the Brexit uncertainty, including the still real risk of a no-deal exit, together with a deterioration in global economic conditions are expected to weigh on investment, trade and productivity – important determinants of economic growth. The deteriorating outlook for productivity is a particular worry as it limits sustained wage growth, living standards and the UK’s longer-term growth potential. 

“The continued pressure on business activity and cashflow from historically high stockpiling, loss of business, and costly contingency planning is expected to limit the extent to which economic activity is able to rebound over the near term. Set against this, UK GDP growth will be supported in part by resilient household consumption and stronger government spending. Bold public spending commitments where the overriding objective is stronger growth and productivity can help support the UK economy at a time of significant change.

“The risks to the outlook for the UK economy remained skewed to the downside. A messy and disorderly departure from the EU would palpably increase the likelihood of the UK economy slipping into a marked downturn, particularly given the lack of actionable information that businesses need to help mitigate some of the impacts of a disorderly exit.”

Responding to the forecast, Adam Marshall, Director General of the British Chambers of Commerce, added:

“Our latest forecast shows a number of warning lights are flashing for the UK economy, even if we are able to avoid a messy and disorderly exit from the EU in just a few weeks’ time.

“There’s no dancing round the fact that Brexit uncertainty has hit business investment hard. In addition to reaching a negotiated settlement with the EU, the government should be preparing big new incentives for business investment in the UK, and should reconfirm its unconditional backing for the big infrastructure projects our economy needs to unlock growth.

“Amidst a slowing global economy and continued political uncertainty, the UK government needs to use the autumn Budget to back infrastructure, help businesses train and re-skill more people, and cut the high up-front costs of doing business in the UK.”

Key points in the forecast:

• UK GDP growth forecast for 2019 is downgraded from 1.3% to 1.2% and from 1.0% to 0.8% in 2020 and remains unchanged at 1.2% in 2021
• Quarter-on-quarter GDP growth is forecast to pick-up to 0.3% in Q3 2019, up from the 0.2% contraction in Q2
• Forecast for business investment growth been downgraded to -1.5% for 2019 (from -1.3%) and to -0.1% for 2020 (from +0.4%), before growth of 0.8% in 2021 (downgraded from 1.1%)
• UK official interest rates are expected to remain at 0.75% throughout 2019 and 2020, before rising to 1.0% in 2021, a year later than in our previous forecast
• UK public sector net borrowing is forecast to be £48.2 billion higher over the next three years than predicted by the Office for Budget Responsibility at the 2019 Spring Statement, reflecting marked changes to government spending commitments and weaker expected tax revenue
• BCC expects export growth of 1.3%, 1.3% and 1.5%, compared to import growth of 4.2%, 1.6% and 2.0%, both are weaker compared to our previous forecast
• Labour productivity is expected to grow by just 0.4% in 2019, 0.6% in 2020 lower than our previous forecast of 0.7% and 0.8% respectively. Our forecast for 2021 remains unchanged at 0.8%
• Forecast for growth in household consumption been upgraded to 1.5% for 2019 (from 1.4%), followed by growth of 1.4% in 2020 and 1.5% in 2021
• Average earnings growth is expected to outstrip inflation over the period, with growth of 2.9%, 2.8% and 2.9% respectively, compared with inflation of 2.1%, 2.2% and 2.1%.

As you may be aware, following a Structure and Prospects Appraisal process led by the Further Education Commissioner, it has been concluded that Easton College should merge with City College Norwich, and Otley with Suffolk New College.

The land-based sector is a crucial part of the Norfolk Economy and Easton and Otley College is very keen for Norfolk businesses to have their say on the proposed merger and the plans for the future of both the Easton and the Otley Campuses.

The Chair, Mark Pendlington has kindly offered a limited number of places for a small number of Norfolk Chambers member businesses to attend the free consultation lunch at the Norfolk Showground on 23 September:

Invitation

On behalf of our Board, I would like to extend an invitation, to join me for an informal lunch event at Royal Norfolk Showground on Monday 23rd September, between 12.30pm and 2pm. Jane Townsend, Principal at Easton and Otley College, and Corrienne Peasgood, Principal at City College Norwich will be attending.  This will be an ideal opportunity for us to update you on our plans, and for us to answer any questions you might have.  

If you would like to be included for the consultation lunch, please can you RSVP to Nova Fairbank by email: nova.fairbank@norfolkchamber.co.uk by no later than close of play on Wednesday 18 September 2019.

Alternatively, you can have your say by taking part in the short online consultation.  The consultation document is located at: https://www.eocmerger.co.uk/ and the deadline for responses to be submitted is 01 October 2019.

Bristol Airport are undertaking research to identify our region’s requirement for travel to the South West.

The aim of the route is to provide connectivity between the two regions and offer businesses an alternative to the current costly and lengthy journey by rail and road.

If this is something that your business would be interested in exploring and feel you can support this route please can we ask you to take a few moments to complete the below link to identify your potential requirement.

Please click HERE to enter the survey, thank you in advance.

All survey results are anonymous.

Commenting on announcement on the two-year post-study work visa, Mike Spicer, Director of Policy at the British Chambers of Commerce said: 

“The British Chambers has long called for the two-year post-study work visa to be restored so this decision is welcome, if not overdue. This visa allows British universities and companies to benefit from the talent and energy of some of the students they have work so hard to train.  

“At a time of critical labour shortages, it’s right that the UK’s immigration system reflects economic reality and removes undue barriers to accessing skills. International students are crucial to the success of UK universities and the business communities in which they operate, and local companies will benefit from the opportunity to harness and develop their talent.”