Case Studies

Combining a career and motherhood is seldom easy, but it was a problem that wasn’t going to daunt entrepreneur, Amanda Ruiz.   Expecting her second child, Amanda was determined to set up her own b...

From being one man with a van, with Colbea’s help Dave Holness set up Holness Construction, which now employs 12 staff and 20 sub-contractors.   Dave started as a carpenter and joiner at just 15 y...

An author, property developer, professional E-bay trader and even an agony aunt! Bob Pugh does it all, very successfully, but in 2006 he needed advice and he came to Colbea business adviser, Liz Kelly to ...

Alison Bird was the winner of the 2007 Best New Business Start-Up Award, presented by the Colchester Business Enterprise Agency. Pictured here is Alison receiving her award from Colchester Mayor, Cllr Ray...

John and Celia Parker-Wilson have realised a dream…to run their own business. The dream became reality when they bought The Natural Food Shop in Colchester town centre during 2005. For some time the...

For today’s businesses, finding the right IT support is up there in the ‘critical’ stakes alongside employing the right people.  Few organisations can function without IT systems that ru...

For some people redundancy can be a tremendous set-back, but for others – such as Sheila Elliott – it can mean the chance of a lifetime. Sheila had been working in the civil service for many years...

Getting married is one of the biggest days of your life, when every girl wants to look and feel like a princess.  There can be few people who understand this better than Abigail Neill, who has started a v...

If anyone wants to know how to start a business and grow it successfully, then they should ask Julie Payne, Managing Director of Apex International, a recruitment company that specialises in filling vacancies ...

For many people, facing the prospect of redundancy is intimidating in the extreme, but not for David Fricker.  When news broke that the framing department of an art and craft shop was to be closed down, D...

As natural resources begin to grow scarce and world security issues threaten oil production, so fuel prices take a hit and the motorist has to pay more at the pumps.  It is a familiar ever-decreasing spir...

With a background in banking and finance, Gary Everett’s move into the world of property may not have been an obvious choice.  Made redundant in May 2003 due to a realignment to core services by the...

MSG Corporate Protection is just over one year old but is proving that it's here to stay. The claim of directors, Mike Cousins and Mark Bell, that it was just one month between the idea and the formation of MS...