Case Studies

Colbea helped convince Janette Lazell that her skills and passion for art and design could become a successful career. Janette has always been passionate about art, attending evening classes in subjects as di...

At the heart of Simply Tapes is an in-depth understanding of the business and the customer base. Richard Prior and Chris Long met in 1999 when they were employed at a packaging company. But their employer hi...

Surely a recession can’t be a good time to start a business?  That’s an understandable and widely held view but there are a surprising number of entrepreneurs who have looked the recession in ...

No strangers to success, Christine Beedle and her business partner, Sara Riley, have just set up a new business called The Conservatory Lining Company. Always keen to embrace a new opportunity, especially whe...

Despite many towns having seen an increase in empty units, new businesses are starting and existing ones are flourishing.  This is certainly a good time to be reporting on the rebounding economy and movin...

Selecting a piece of jewellery is very personal, often done to mark a celebration or indicate an emotional bond. To have a piece of jewellery made uniquely for the person and the occasion is a rare and special...

It is a rare to find a business that flourishes during a recession, especially within the retail sector, but Bee Mine is such a business. A wedding dress agency based in Osborne Street, Colchester, it is owned...

Fashion retail is notoriously difficult to get into, and even those who do manage to set up a business often find it hard to compete against the high street giants. Perhaps what’s required is a different...

In May 2006 father and son, Ian and Joe Pierson set up I & J Wood Floors based in Clacton-on-Sea, to supply and fit solid wood flooring and real-wood engineered flooring (real-wood laminate).   Ian...

Alan Jones and Karen Bury always dreamed of providing a more modern and relaxed style of school photography with a better quality of life for themselves, and in June 2007 they took the big step by setting up &...

Charles Cornish, co-owner of Mortgage-Central Limited first came across Colbea in 2003 when he was working for an independent financial adviser based in their Business Incubation Centre.   Knowing how C...

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 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 MSG, belies the planning, consid...