Miranda Barker OBE Chief executive
@elancschamber
BUSINESS VOICE NEEDED NOW –
▲ Wallsauce, a Great Harwood e-commerce business specialising in custom printed wall murals, has announced plans to bolster its share of the B2B market with an increased focus on trade customers. The company is set to develop closer ties with large corporate customers, as well as starting to offer trade accounts to interior designers, decorators, architects and fit-out companies.
▲ Video wall systems installed by Burnley- based Ultimate Visual Solutions (UVS) at a major transport hub in the midlands are approaching 50,000 hours of continuous 24/7 operation. UVS supplied and installed all equipment through its systems integrator partner TIS, which specialises in driving digital transformation and integration across the life safety, security and communications industry.
▲ Made Smarter Adoption North West, the trailblazing digital technology adoption programme, has secured an additional £230,000 to help more Lancashire-based SME manufacturers access transformational technology.
▲ Luxury cruise retailer Panache Cruises has expanded its team and reported a record start to 2025. The Chorley-based company had a record-breaking 2024, growing turnover by more than 50 per cent to more than £25m. January is a crucial month in the travel industry and Panache Cruises witnessed a surge in bookings.
▲ Hyndburn-based music event production company, iMEP, has continued its investment in the borough after taking over the lease of a second facility in Accrington town centre.
▲ Skelmersdale-based online bathroom retailer, Victorian Plumbing, negotiated a ‘year of transformation’ to achieve a rise in annual sales in the 12 months to September 30, 2024. Financial figures for the reporting period showed it hit £295.7m in revenues, a four per cent improvement on the previous year.
▲ Plans to expand a Perspex International site in Darwen – part of almost £40m of new investment supported by the Town Deal – have been passed. The new Polymerisation Hall and Energy Centre at Perspex International’s Chapels Park site will mean the firm can streamline its processes and make manufacturing greener – substantially reducing water and energy consumption.
DOWN
▼ Technology group ClearCourse has closed its Preston operation less than three years after it announced the creation of a ‘Northern Tech Hub’ in the city. The group, which provides software services and an embedded payments platform, moved into Evolution House, the distinctive ‘Google-style’ office in Fulwood, following its acquisition of e-commerce business EKM.
▼ Business confidence in the North West fell by five points during January to 45 per cent, but remained above the UK average, according to the latest Business Barometer from Lloyds. Companies in the North West reported lower confidence in their own business prospects month-on- month, down two points at 51 per cent. When taken alongside their optimism in the economy, down seven points to 39
per cent, this gives a headline confidence reading of 45 per cent compared to 50 per cent in December.
▼ A long-established Lancashire business and community support organisation has gone into administration. Blackburn based Community and Business Partners (CBP) can trace its origins back more than 30 years and has grown to deliver business mentoring and coaching across Lancashire and the North West.
▼ The latest ‘Red Flag Alert’ report from corporate recovery specialist Begbies Traynor, based in Preston, revealed a worrying surge in the number of businesses across Lancashire entering ‘critical’ financial distress in the final quarter of 2024. The number rose by 64 per cent to 976 companies.
TIME FOR CHANGE! On the one hand, we have the move to a County Combined Authority (CCA), with a mayor to take their seat eventually. On the other, local government reorganisation (LGR) now also raises its head.
The Lancashire CCA is now a reality, it’s there in black and white, signed into existence by Westminster. Now we have to give it colour, passion, vibrancy, promise – and pitch to government a growth plan that screams potential waiting to be fulfilled, invested in and made real.
Meanwhile, LGR has been a near permanent obsession and debating point across Lancashire’s district for decades.
But it now has legs, or at least a timetable to some sort of conclusion. The broad government ask is that we have only unitary authorities and that they each represent around 500,000 people which, by that measure, would suggest three for Lancashire.
But how many unitaries is the right number of authorities for us? What combination of districts gives us economic strength, a cohesive local voice, a natural restructure? How do we ensure we represent all of Lancashire’s disparate needs and can unitary leaders work cohesively with the Combined Authority Board?
These are the questions facing Lancashire now. And for economic strength we need a powerful business voice in that discussion. We need to lift it away from the parochial to the unlocking of potential. It’s a huge opportunity to change Lancashire for the good but it has to be done the right way.
Bring it on.
Call us on 01254 356400 or visit
chamberelancs.co.uk
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IN VIEW
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