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Peninsula awarded Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award for super service

Sam Whitear
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Manchester-based, global employment law consultancy, Peninsula has received the inaugural Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award, which recognises businesses that deliver super service and exceptional experiences, as rated by real clients.

Feefo gives Platinum Trusted Service awards to businesses that have achieved the Feefo Gold standard for three consecutive years or more. Peninsula has reached this standard for an outstanding four successive years and received the Feefo Platinum Trusted Service Award in 2020 when it was initially launched. Last year, Peninsula earned over 1,000 Feefo independent five-star reviews for the superb service clients experience.

Peter Done, Founder and Group Managing Director of Peninsula said:

“In these challenging times, it’s important to celebrate the positives. We’re delighted to receive this award and continue to put our clients at the heart of everything we do. Achieving the inaugural Feefo Platinum Trusted Service award is special and reflects our team’s commitment to delivering an excellent experience. It has taken every one of us working at our peak; from the office to our homes. The logistics of maintaining the level of service we have, considering the demand we experienced, is remarkable, and we feel a real sense of achievement. This was uncharted territory, and we adapted to ensure all our clients had the support they needed. The kind of super service we delivered became more and more complex, but we lived and breathed the idea that nothing but the very best support would do.”

Congratulating Peninsula on winning this year’s award, Steph Heasman, Director of Customer Success at Feefo, commented:

“The Trusted Service award has always been about recognising companies that are outstanding in customer experience and generate great feedback from happy customers.

“This year, despite the incredible challenges of a global pandemic, so many companies using Feefo have continued to provide remarkably high levels of service, and they deserve a huge amount of credit for what they have achieved. It’s why we have changed our criteria to be fair to the organisations that have struggled in such difficult circumstances. At Feefo we help our clients give their customers the best experiences possible.

“I’m confident that throughout 2021 we’ll see even greater customer experience achievements from our partners as we return to something like business-as-usual.”

CITY CENTRE EXPANSION FOR MANCHESTER ENGINEERING FIRM

Sam Whitear
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Adept Civil and Structural Consulting Engineers is significantly expanding its Manchester operation after relocating to new city centre offices on St James Square, in a move that will create several new jobs this year.

The new office covers 1,200 sq ft on the fourth floor of Number 7 St James Square, which sits between John Dalton Street and South King Street. Adept, which is headquartered in Leeds, was previously based at Sevendale House, in the city’s Stevenson Square conservation area.
Since expanding into Manchester five years ago, the company has won numerous contracts throughout the North West, spanning all sectors including rail, education, industrial and residential projects. Adept now employs a team of six in Manchester.

Neil Brown, a director at Adept, who heads up the company’s Manchester office, said: “In recent years, Adept has provided structural and civil engineering services for a vast range of projects in the region.

“These range from large scale industrial units through to several school extensions and new homes developments, meaning we’ve quickly made our mark across the North West. Our team has grown in line with this, to the point where we had outgrown our previous premises, and we’re looking forward to recruiting several new people in the coming months to meet the demand of future contracts.

“7 St James Square is a newly refurbished building that offers high quality office accommodation, with great communal facilities, right in the heart of Manchester city centre, meaning it’s highly accessible for our team and clients.

“It also offers the opportunity for us to expand further, making it the ideal base as we embark on our next phase of growth and continue building on our presence and reputation in the North West.”

Adept provides a full range of civil and structural engineering solutions. These include surveys and reports, feasibility advice for new schemes, BIM services, geo-environmental studies, site investigations, conceptual and detailed drawings, flood-risk and drainage assessments and highway design.

GROWTH PROMPTS KINAXIA TO CREATE NEW SENIOR FINANCE ROLES

Sam Whitear
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Kinaxia Logistics has created three senior roles in its finance team in line with the group’s increased breadth and scale.
Mike Lyons has been appointed group governance director after moving from his post as finance director at Trafford Park-based AKW Group, which became part of Kinaxia in 2018.

His new role sees him working with managing directors, finance directors and sales teams across Kinaxia’s business units with a focus on risk management, compliance and assisting with contractual and service level agreements and new large accounts.

Mike spent 20 years at AKW Group in a variety of finance roles, during which the business has increased turnover from £5m to over £30m.

Gary Thompson has joined Kinaxia as regional finance director for the north.
He assumes responsibility for Kinaxia companies AKW Global Logistics and AKW Global Warehousing, Bay Freight in Stalybridge, William Kirk in Macclesfield and Fresh Freight in Gateshead, and will provide direction and support to their existing finance teams.

Gary has extensive transport and warehousing sector experience, most recently at Bibby Distribution, where he held a number of senior finance roles over seven years. Before that he worked at XPO Logistics Europe and API Group and TDG.
Sharon Deakin has joined Kinaxia as group financial controller. She previously held senior financial and commercial leadership roles at several logistics and warehousing companies, including senior vice-president finance at Ceva Logistics.

Kinaxia’s group finance director Ben Warrillow said: “Mike, Gary and Sharon have a wealth of expertise and a deep understanding of the industry.

“Their appointments will greatly benefit the wider group by strengthening the capacity and capability of our finance function in line with the increasing breadth and scale of the company.”

Kinaxia comprises 13 freight and logistics businesses across the UK with over 1,600 staff and more than 800 vehicles.

The group, which has its headquarters in Macclesfield, Cheshire, has two million sq ft of warehouse facilities nationwide, offering contract packing, e-fulfilment, returns management and storage services.
It has seen significant and continued growth over recent years, with annual revenues now approaching £200m.

Kinaxia was recently recognised as one of Britain’s leading mid-market private companies with its inclusion in the 16th annual Sunday Times PwC Top Track 250 league table, based on sales.

A major boost to the promotion of entrepreneurship at the University

Sam Whitear
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A landmark memorandum of understanding has been signed between The University of Manchester Students’ Union (UMSU) and the Masood Entrepreneurship Centre (MEC) at Alliance Manchester Business School.

This document encapsulates the desires of both organisations to take forward a proactive and positive agenda for promoting entrepreneurship education, co-curricular activities, mentorship and the support needed to launch a start-up business, especially for increasing start-ups among international and female students. This area of collaboration has been specifically defined as ‘Developing Entrepreneurship for All – to empower the next generation of student entrepreneurs to take control of their futures’.

Led by Students’ Union General Secretary Kwame Kwarteng and Women’s Officer Chenze Ma and supported by colleagues in the SU and MEC, it will see both parties work towards the establishment of a long-term, mutually beneficial and enduring annual programme of entrepreneurial support activity for students and their societies that becomes a recognised ‘beacon’ amongst its peers.

Lynn Sheppard, Director of MEC said: “Our Vision at MEC is to build an entrepreneurial ecosystem that nurtures the next generation of outstanding innovators to achieve economic and societal benefit worldwide. This agreement underpins the joint desires of Kwame, Chenze and colleagues at the Students’ Union, combined with the MEC team, to support a dynamic culture within our excellent facilities ensuring everyone has the opportunity to succeed and ensure we empower the next generation of student entrepreneurs to take control of their futures.”

Kwame Kwarteng, General Secretary of UMSU added: “For so many of our students, innovating and starting their own business is at the heart of their ambition. The recovery of economies across the world is going to require new solutions to problems and we want to play a role in helping them create and achieve those ambitions. The opportunity to work with one of the leading enterprise centres through the team at MEC will add huge value to our work, and support our student leaders, societies and groups to create new results.”

BGFG plans to attract more talent to Manchester with major recruitment drive

Sam Whitear
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A rapidly growing gaming and tech publishing house is to create 30 new jobs to further enhance Manchester’s reputation as an economic powerhouse in digital and creative industries.

The new jobs in multimedia and digital content follow a successful investment round completed by the team at By Gamers for Gamers.

The Manchester-based firm, which announced its move to popular workspace Use Space in September 2020, raised significant monies via angel investment to facilitate working growth capital and support its acquisition ambitions.

As a result, it is now commencing a major recruitment drive to attract talented people from across the UK to support the development of its growing online media outlets, which include WePC.com, PCGuide.com and EsportsVerdict.com

The company intends to tap into Manchester’s potential for growth and help ‘level up’ the economic North-South divide.

Co-Founder Craig Kirkcaldy, who headed up the investment round, said: “Manchester is an exciting, growing and vibrant place with a burgeoning digital and creative business scene coming together to produce a collective force.

“The latest investment means we can push ahead with our plans to increase the talent in our business and create 30 new jobs.

“We are looking to recruit the best people from across the UK and introduce them to Manchester and the North, maybe for the first time.

“The digital landscape of the UK is changing fast with some of the biggest names in media heading North, not least with the BBC who have invested heavily in Salford already. We aim to be in the vanguard as Manchester powers forward as it will as we emerge from the pandemic.”

By Gamers for Gamers, founded in April 2019 by brothers Andrew and Craig Kirckaldy and Will Blears, comprises a team of experienced, passionate individuals dedicated to bringing readers the best in unbiased PC tech, gaming, and Esports news.

With millions of readers each month, its continued purpose is to provide readers with hands-on reviews and practical buying advice as well as tips to get the most out of their tech and gaming setup.

Its network of sites, all work together to form a tight-knit family of consumer-focused brands with one goal: empowering readers.

Craig added: “We are lucky to already have a team comprising gamers from all walks of life that share a passion for the technology they play on, and now we want to enable others to join that team and be part of an excellent workplace culture.

“Being in Manchester and being in a warehouse-style space which includes an immersive racing Sim and a virtual reality station we have a workplace to match the lifestyle that people can enjoy in the North.

“We want to accelerate the momentum of Manchester being a leading digital and creative hub of the UK. We have further ambitious plans for recruitment and growth. Manchester offers some incredible opportunities.”

Arctic Shores technology drives diversity in recruitment by up to 100%

Sam Whitear
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Leading brands are adopting behaviour-based assessments from Arctic Shores to drive forward diversity in recruitment. For Siemens, one of the world’s leading engineering and manufacturing companies, Arctic Shores increased female-final stage representation by 100%, doubling the number of women progressed to the final stages of their process.

Arctic Shores has also just been named in the prestigious Deloitte Fast 50 and picked up two Gold Awards at this year’s BOC’s HR Brilliance Awards with client Capita and its Customer Management Division. The first award recognised Arctic Shores in the ‘Brilliance in Innovative Use of Technology’ category, and the second in ‘Brilliance in Recruitment and Retention.’ This recognition comes alongside Arctic Shores recently adding its two-millionth candidate to the platform, just ten months after the company hit one million candidates in January 2020.

According to recent Arctic Shores research with HR leaders, diversity and inclusion is high on the list of priorities and concerns for 2021, with many having low confidence that the talent acquisition process was consistent or fair.

Powered by psychology, cognitive neuroscience and data science, Arctic Shores’ behaviour-based assessments and platform solution are designed to remove unconscious bias from key points in the recruitment process, which is the single biggest reason for the slow progress on diversity – and with less diversity comes lower performance. With an assessment that includes interactive tasks instead of questions in a mobile-first design, the assessment measures natural behaviours, so businesses get a truer measure of a person’s potential. Businesses, including clients Adecco and PwC, are adopting Arctic Shores’ technology to improve diversity ratios, reduce time-to-hire and recruitment costs.

Flagship client Capita has seen a vast improvement in its hiring process. By using the Arctic Shores talent discovery platform, Capita was able to screen over 12,000 candidates for its customer management roles; 60% of these (about 7,200) completed the assessment within 24 hours, giving the team near-instant access to the objective data they needed to make faster, fairer sifting decisions. And, with COVID-19 preventing in-person contact, Capita was (and continues to be) able to find exceptional talent 100% remotely.

The company has also stepped up its growth with the appointment of three new executives to strengthen its leadership team. Rachel Dennis (Chief Marketing Officer), Estelle McCartney (Chief Customer Officer) and Claire Jaques (Chief Product Officer) will help the firm accelerate product innovation, increase customer focus and boost its market presence as it looks to 2021.

Robert Newry, CEO and Co-Founder at Arctic Shores, commented: “The last twelve months have been a time of colossal change and we have seen a renewed emphasis not just on digital transformation but on diversity in the workplace. Using a ‘no knowledge’ approach to identify potential and find the most suitable talent has been long overdue within organisations, and I’m proud of our clients who are leading the way.

After a year that has ushered in economic uncertainty and numerous job losses, it’s imperative to help support both the transition of the economy and the vast pool of people now stuck in between jobs in the year ahead. This transition represents an opportunity to redefine recruitment processes, to make them fairer and more consistent.

2021 will be an opportunity for even more businesses to open their eyes to the vast improvements that technology can bring, and the positive impact, when used properly, to drive diversity, inclusion and efficiency in the talent acquisition process.”

St John’s Court secures first letting with Steven Stone

Sam Whitear
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Family business Steven Stone are the first tenant to take space at PJD Property’s newly-refurbished St. John’s Court on Quay Street, Manchester, taking the third floor suite of 1076 sq ft on a 9 year lease.

Totalling 4,842 sq ft and in a prime location opposite Spinningfields and next to the new St John’s District, PJD Property purchased St. John’s Court in 2018, and over the last two years have undertaken a comprehensive refurbishment with new finishes throughout to bring the building up to Grade A standard including air conditioning, new lift, WC`s and a remodelled entrance and reception area.

The second floor of 1262 sq ft is being fully fitted and furnished to offer a “plug & play” opportunity for prospective tenants. This will include the creation of a meeting room, kitchen area and provision of carpeting, lights and desks throughout meaning that tenants have no need for any significant capital expenditure when taking the space. This solution is also available on the ground and first floors, if required. The design and fit-out is being undertaken by OBI Property.

Founded in Manchester in 1937, Steven Stone is relocating from its Manchester city centre operation in Spinningfields to St. John’s Court and will offer a new modern, unique experience to selling engagement rings, wedding rings and bespoke diamond jewellery. Customers will be taken through a special journey of “The Stone Way” showcasing Steven Stone’s unique fine jewellery experience. The showroom will run an appointment only system.

Mark Davies, director of PJD Property, said: “We are delighted to welcome Steven Stone to St John’s Court. They are a company with a long-standing reputation in Manchester and it is good to have them in the building as our first tenant. Despite this last year creating a challenging environment for all, we’ve been encouraged by the level of interest in St John’s Court and hope to make further announcements in the near future.”

Zack Stone, Managing Director of Steven Stone said: “St John’s Court ticked all the boxes for us – the space has an abundance of natural light, which is key in our business, and it’s in a great location. The visitor journey is of real importance to us and we felt that St John’s Court provided us with the right consumer experience. We’re looking forward to opening in April 2021.”

Canning O’Neill acted on behalf of PJD Property.

STRATEGIC ACQUISITION TO DEVELOP ONLINE MARKETPLACE

Sam Whitear
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boohoo, a leading online fashion retailer, announces that it has acquired all of the intellectual property assets (including customer data and related business information and selected contracts) of Debenhams Retail Limited (in administration) (“Debenhams”) from its joint administrators, for £55 million (plus VAT) in cash (the “Transaction”).

Debenhams is a long-standing and leading UK fashion and beauty retailer with high brand awareness, and an established online platform with approximately 300 million UK website visits per annum. This makes it a top 10 retail website in the UK by traffic.

The Transaction represents a fantastic opportunity to grow the Group’s target addressable market and increase the share of wallet opportunity through a new capital light and low risk operating model that is complementary to the Group’s highly successful direct-to-consumer multi-brand platform.

The Group intends to rebuild and relaunch the Debenhams platform, helping further the Group’s stated ambition to lead the fashion eCommerce market, and grow into new categories including beauty, sport and homeware through:

Marketplace: Creating the UK’s largest marketplace across fashion, beauty, sport and homeware. The Group plans to expand the range of products sold via the Debenhams marketplace by maintaining existing marketplace brand relationships and adding new brands over time. The relaunched marketplace will also provide an exciting new route to market for the Group’s existing brand portfolio
Beauty: The Group will continue to operate the current wholesale model, but will also look to add new beauty brands via the marketplace model
Own brand fashion: Debenhams’ own fashion brands will be absorbed into boohoo’s current brand portfolio and sold via the core Debenhams site and their own pureplay websites

John Lyttle, CEO, commented:

“The acquisition of the Debenhams brand is an important development for the Group, as we seek to capture incremental growth opportunities arising from the accelerating shift to online retail. We have developed a successful multi-brand direct-to-consumer platform that continues to disrupt the markets that we operate in. The acquisition represents an exciting strategic opportunity to transform our target addressable market through the creation of an online marketplace that leverages Debenhams’ high brand awareness and traffic through the development of beauty and fashion partnerships connecting brands with consumers.”

Mahmud Kamani, Executive Chairman, commented:

“This is a transformational deal for the Group, which allows us to capture the fantastic opportunity as eCommerce continues to grow. Our ambition is to create the UK’s largest marketplace. Our acquisition of the Debenhams brand is strategically significant as it represents a huge step which accelerates our ambition to be a leader, not just in fashion eCommerce, but in new categories including beauty, sport and homeware.”

Strategic Rationale

1. Unlocking Debenhams’ online opportunity

Transforming Debenhams through the development of an exciting online marketplace, capitalising on the sector’s structural shift to online
Utilising Debenhams’ existing pureplay brands and extensive third party brand relationships as the foundations for the marketplace
Further developing new third party fashion and beauty partnerships, giving brands control over the range of products offered on the marketplace and access to Debenhams’ significant customer base
Growing Debenhams’ product categories and expanding its supplier partnerships
2. Boohoo’s entry into the beauty, sports and homeware market

Entering the beauty market at scale – Debenhams is one of the UK’s leading prestige beauty retailers across make-up, skincare and fragrance
Debenhams has 6 million beauty shoppers and 1.4 million Beauty Club members
Opportunity to extend partnerships into new categories such as sport and homeware
3. Enhanced revenue growth opportunities across the Group

Significant opportunity to leverage Debenhams’ customer database and develop the platform for international markets in the future
Debenhams offers an additional route to market for the Group’s existing brands
Extending the Group’s brand portfolio through the acquisition of Debenhams’ pureplay own brands including Maine, Mantaray, Principles and Faith

Debenhams is expected to relaunch on the Group’s platform in Q1 FY22. In order to allow for the winding down of Debenhams’ operations, Debenhams will continue to operate its website for an agreed period before the relaunch on the Group’s platform and a licence has been granted to allow for the winding down of Debenhams’ retail stores (when they are in a position to re-open) for an additional period. The Transaction will be financed through the Group’s existing cash balance, which stood at £386.9m on 31 December 2020. The Group will only be acquiring the brands and associated intellectual property rights – the Transaction does not include Debenhams’ retail stores, stock or any financial services.

In Debenhams’ most recent financial year to 31 August 2020, its online business generated unaudited online net revenues of approximately £400 million, via the following operating models:

Marketplace: Approximately 25% of the online revenue (primarily fashion and homewares)
Beauty: Approximately 20% of the online revenue via a traditional wholesale model
Own brand fashion: Approximately 25% of the online revenue (key brands include Maine, Mantaray, Principles and Faith)
Wholesale inventory: Approximately 30% of the online revenue (bought from third-party brands, including fashion, sport and homeware), which will not continue to operate under the Group’s ownership
The Transaction is not expected to contribute to the Group’s revenues over the remaining five weeks of the current financial year (FY 2021), and is expected to incur modest start-up losses. The Group will provide a further update at its Full Year results in early May 2021.

In its most recent financial year to 31 August 2020, Debenhams generated unaudited Gross Transaction Value of £1.524 billion and unaudited EBITDA of £12.7 million. These figures include all revenues and associated costs for store-based and international operations.

56% of North West businesses expected to invest in their eCommerce capabilities in 2021 with 88% confident of growth

Sam Whitear
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56% of North West businesses are expected to invest in their eCommerce capabilities over the next 12 months according to a recent survey by Digitl, the Manchester based web design and marketplace agency.

Digitl approached 250 businesses to better understand how firms have used eCommerce to weather the pandemic and how their use of it may change as things begin to get back to normal. Contributors included companies primarily operating in the retail, property, tech and professional service sectors.

78% of all respondents had increased their use of eCommerce since the start of the COVID-19 crisis. Whilst 55% of retailers had used external marketplaces for the first time to drive sales with over 80% of them choosing Amazon – mainly because of its profile and reach. 75% confirmed that the decision to use an external marketplace had played a considerable factor in helping them survive 2020.

48% of all service-based businesses had also ramped up their ability to provide online transactions with law and accountancy firms leading the way.

In terms of business confidence, 88% of firms believed that they would see growth in 2021 with most citing average upturns of around 15-25%. However, there is still caution with an effective vaccine rollout and the easing of lockdown restrictions by early Spring being key factors.

Darren Ratcliffe – founder of Digitl– said: “2020 was an unprecedented year, and despite Primark announcing that it won’t be starting online sales despite losing £100m a month, this survey shows that many North West businesses thought on their feet, adapted and realised why investing in eCommerce.  Whether that’s product or service related – is key if they want to not just survive COVID but thrive after it. Now more than ever, giving customers the ability to access the products you offer in as simple a way as possible needs to be central to every business’ strategy.”

Evans Textiles donates to Salford charity providing vital support to members during the pandemic

Sam Whitear
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Manchester-based leading soft furnishing supplier, Evans Textiles has donated £3,250 to Salford Heart Care charity to support the vital emotional and social activities that the charity runs across the City of Salford through “Healthy Heart Clubs”.

The donation represents a valuable contribution to the charity’s administration and club at Irlam. The club offers gentle exercise sessions, emotional support and finds ways to ease stress to improve health and wellbeing. From weight management support through to healthy living advice, the donation will help the club continue to deliver services to its members to prevent heart disease and heart attacks, reduce social isolation in communities and improve health and emotional well-being.

Managing Director, Paul Callan commented: “It’s a fantastic local charity and we’re pleased to play our small part in doing something positive in what has been an extremely challenging year for us all.”
Serena Rice, Salford Heart Care’s Coordinator, said: “We are overwhelmed by the Evans Textiles’ generosity. We were completely blown away by the donation and cannot thank you enough.” In admiration of the donation, Salford Heart Care members and enthusiast model coach builders, Brendon and Nancy, created bespoke branded vehicles for Evans Textiles.

Paul concluded; “We know that the donation will make a huge difference to the incredible work that Salford Heart Care do. The organisation is dedicated to providing safe places for those affected by heart conditions and social deprivation can be empowered with confidence. We’re very proud that our donation is going to an incredible cause – and of course, our model van has now taken pride of place in our showroom.”

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