Brick Customer Shortlisted for Business Award
Local business owners Peter and Kathy Cunliffe have been shortlisted for this year’s ‘No Limits 1000 Business Award’ in the Innovation & Technology Category at Ewood Park this Wednesday, 30th June.
Babywise is a long-established business based in Darwen, specialising in the manufacture of baby and children’s mattresses and were awarded a No Limits Technology Innovation Grant to develop their manufacturing processes and a website.
Kathy worked with Brick Technology in 2007 to create their website and says, ‘Having an e-commerce site has changed our business completely. It used to be just me and Peter working together (in the office), but in the last twelve months we’ve had to take on ten new staff (which includes three office based) due to all the new orders we’ve been getting! It was a steep learning curve at first, but Brick’s simple website content management system was really easy to use and they didn’t use ‘teccie speak’ when explaining how everything works so we picked it up really quick!’.
Michael McNicolas, the Innovation and Technology Advisor at Regenerate Pennine Lancashire nominated Babywise for the award and comments, ‘I nominated Babywise because of the impact the e-commerce site had on their overall business. Babywise were originally selling wholesale and by using Brick’s system they have been able to create an online retail business turning over close to 1 million pounds in just 3 years. Kathy and Peter had no previous online retail experience and it was for this reason and the high growth element of their business success that caught our eyes.’
Due to the triumph of their original website Babywise have recently worked with us once more, to redesign their original website www.babymattressesonline.co.uk Kathy’s even bought herself a new Apple iPad so she can keep an eye on her business wherever she is, stating, ‘Brick websites on iPad are a dream! Loads of competitor’s websites are a pain to look at this way, so I hope I’ll be one of the favourites to buy from’.
On asking Kathy if she had any advice to offer other Lancashire business owners, Kathy simply said, ‘I’d tell them, get online straight away! We haven’t looked back!
We’d like to wish Kathy and Peter the best of luck for Wednesday and congratulations on the success of www.babymattressesonline.co.uk
For more information on Brick websites call 01254 277190 or email Claire Smalley on c.smalley@brickweb.co.uk