Rising Stars light the way to a brighter future for Derby

Derby has a number of dynamic up-and-coming new businesses, as highlighted by the winners and runners-up in its annual Rising Stars competition.

Marketing Derby’s Annual Business Event (ABE) film showcased the winner of this year’s competition, The Swap Shop.

But for the first time in the history of the competition, due to the incredibly high standard of entries, six highly commended entries were selected, who together form ‘the galaxy’.

That galaxy is made up of MiniAperture Photography, GoldBox Productions, Divine Box, Parry Creative, The Crinkle Project and Crafty You Crafty Me.

The Rising Stars competition, organised by Marketing Derby, aims to give entrepreneurs and new businesses a helping hand.

For winning the competition, The Swap Shop received a year's free Bondholder membership and a year of free PR and communications support from Nielsen McAllister.

The highly commended entries also received a year of free Bondholder membership.

In the ABE film, it was revealed how the idea for The Swap Shop came out of a Marketing Derby Talking Business Live webinar back in April last year, when Tracy Harrison, from the charity Safe and Sound, suggested the idea of somewhere businesses and organisations could ‘swap’ goods and services.

The idea was subsequently developed by bid-writing consultancy Ask the Chameleon, triathlon kit specialist HUUB and creative design agency think3.

Initially launched as Derby Swap Shop, the free-to-use online platform has proven a big success, expanding into other geographical areas. Recently, the concept went national and the business rebranded itself as The Swap Shop.

To watch the ABE film, featuring the Rising Star companies, click here.