THE Camelford Business Alliance is hoping to provide support and networking opportunities to the town and surrounding area’s local businesses.

The group, led by Kevin Parcel from The Countryman Hotel and Bill LeGrys of LeGrys Bespoke, met for their second fortnightly meeting on Wednesday, August 21. The pair, who have both started new ventures in the town, are assisted by Ayla Ackroyd-Johnson — a town councillor who also works at The Really Groovy Shop in the town centre — in the promotion of the group and its meetings.

Ayla said: “We’re meeting fortnightly and at the last meeting we had eleven people, which is really good. Bill and Kev are the founding members of the group — Bill has the new estate agents (LeGrys Bespoke) and Kev is running The Countryman (Hotel). They wanted to round up the businesses in the town because they’re both part of BMI, helping businesses to connect. Then they started this and they asked me to help promote it and be a representative of the town council. It’s all about introducing these different businesses to each other and giving their business cards.

“We have six new businesses here already. One of the main things is to network with the town and to help each other. We all give a minute’s speech where we can talk about our business and what we want from the meeting.”

The meeting began just before 6pm, with many businesses closing for the day at around 5.30pm. Due to Bill’s absence, Kevin took the reins for the evening. He said: “This is the second of these meetings which we will hold every other Wednesday.

“These meetings are all about networking, so we can all understand what everyone does in their business and recommend these businesses to other people. I’ll introduce myself and everyone gets the chance to introduce themselves too — that’s what networking is all about.

“We are trusted people in this room, which means we can recommend each other to those needing a certain service. A networking group can charge up to £1,000 a year. We don’t charge a penny, we want to be putting business into the community.”

Kevin explained that he would like to have an introduction to the Davidstow Creamery, with numerous contractors due to be coming to the area as part of the company’s extension project. He continued: “Networking is already working in this town. We have given business to others and get it back.”

Those in attendance included Alan and Claire from The Camels Garden, a fruit and veg shop which opened earlier in the year; Daniel Kavanagh from Daniel Kavanagh Bronze and Ceramic Fine Art, who is running a shop to sell his phenomenal pieces of artwork; Rob and Natalie Chandler who are looking to renovate a former care home into a six-bed Bed and Breakfast within the next few months, called Chandlers Lodge; Sue and Paul Isherwood from Four Seasons cafe, who also own a mobile catering van called ‘Hells Kitchen’; Terry and Julie from the newly opened Crystal Coffee Shop, who said they are looking to see the community come together; Julie Ferris from the Slimming World Camelford group; Debbie and Gary Balaam from Culloden Farmouse B&B; Wendy from Needle and Thread; and Ayla from The Really Groovy Shop, who was also representing the shop’s owner Paul.

Julie from Slimming World Camelford said: “Sixty per cent of people need support with their weight. I have lost nine stone myself and I think the main thing for me with this is, you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours, really. For me, I want to get more people out and about, support people’s weight and people’s businesses.”

Debbie from Culloden Farmouse B&B agreed. She said: “Since we’ve been here we’ve seen changes come and go. I’d like to see Camelford really thriving. It’s a wonderful place, it’s between the moor and the sea and I’d like to see Camelford in the position it should be in — we’ve got all these lovely things, we should be utilising it.”

Kevin said: “We can all get things from these meetings — there are other areas we can explore. It’s all about surrounding ourselves with good, trustworthy people.

“I built my last business in networking. Since being here, it’s been really difficult to find traders. We wanted some windows doing and we were told six to nine months! We need to spread the word and tell everybody.”

Aside from The Countryman Hotel, which he and his partner Sue Evason took on a matter of weeks ago, Kevin’s business is a Bristol-based building company specialising in HMO properties, turning the likes of three-bed houses into five-bed houses for rental, generating around £600 a room per month in the Bristol area.

Alan and Claire from The Camel Gardens said they would like to branch their produce out to venues around Camelford and its surrounding area, as well as expand some of the products they already offer. Sue said: “Why are you not pushing your bouquets of flowers? I had a lovely bouquet for my birthday and they were absolutely beautiful.

“We’re in the middle of refurbishing a bar here at The Countryman, which we would like to make into a private venue for people, it won’t be running for the public. But we will need caterers and flowers, and I would like a party planner too.”

Julie suggested putting Sue in contact with her friend, who is a party and event planner. Kevin said: “This is networking! We have a venue that will need wedding planners, cakes, flowers and more.”

Paul and Sue were keen to see an increase in business at their cafe, which is situated by the picturesque River Camel in the centre of the town. The pair also run a mobile catering van called Hells Kitchen, and would like to expand their range of cakes.

Julie was keen to work with Paul and Sue collaboratively with Slimming World. She said: “I’d like us to work together with the healthy eating. If we knew that you could do healthier options for people as well, that would be really good.”

Sue said: “That’s why we’re doing more vegan options. We’re trying to cater for both now.”

Terry and Julie opened the Crystal Coffee Shop recently in the town. Terry said: “The town needs an attraction. If there’s nothing to look at then people won’t stay. We’ve had quite a lot of walkers in, walking on the moors. A lot of them want to walk the trail on the rivers but they can only get so far because then it becomes overgrown.”

Ayla explained that a new town website is in the offing, to be called www.lovecamelford.co.uk. She said: “When people google Camelford, it’s not going to be stabbing and water poisoning that comes up — it will be all the good things the town has to offer, perhaps including local walks and other activities, so it’s going to be up to date.”

In regards to walkers and routes, Kevin suggested a task force be established to look further into options to expand this. Terry added: “We need to target locals. There’s got to be certain ways of encouraging local people into the town.”

Wendy agreed, stating she had a customer who had said they didn’t know that she was there. Debbie said that local people are needed in the town during the winter months.

Ayla said: “I am going to put it to town council to have a map of some sort to point out the different places around the town.”

Terry added: “Camelford does have a lot going for it. Tintagel is well known for the castle and Boscastle is known for the witches.”

Discussions soon moved on to the parking situation in Camelford, with the town council having started charging in the spring in the Churchfield car park. However, the car park offers two hours’ free parking, with the charge being 50p after that.

Julie, whose Slimming World group is based in Clease Hall, said: “It has had a detrimental effect on my business. I have about 80 people come to group and they can’t park by the time they get there. They have experienced verbal abuse and I get abuse on Facebook as well. It can be detrimental to my members who can be vulnerable. I have been photo documenting it and will write to the county council.”

Debbie said: “The town council work really hard but how they came to the decision to charge for that car park, I don’t know.”

With Four Seasons just down from the entrance of Churchfield car park, Paul said: “All they see if ‘pay’ and so they think, ‘no, we’ll carry on’. Because it’s a limited town, people don’t take a chance!”

The proposed bypass soon came up in the discussions. Sue said: “If they’re going to pedestrianise it like Wadebridge, then it will be a good thing. But if not it will kill the town.”

As a town councillor, Ayla was keen to reiterate the positives of the bypass. She said: “It’s going to cut pollution in the town. On Saturdays I used to avoid the town because it would be up to an hour queue of traffic, but now it’s going to change for the better.”

One of the main concerns about the bypass for these businesses was how it is going to direct traffic around the town centre, with fears it could take potential business from them. Ayla said the bypass won’t be ready until 2023, so the group has four years to come up with a plan on how to ensure enough business is still coming in.

Debbie said: “I would be more inclined to come to Camelford if I wasn’t breathing in the fumes and almost killed by the traffic.”

Ayla added: “We’ve been granted the first bit (of funding) from Cornwall Council so that’s a massive support system.”

The group discussed how to attract more people into the town, and Kevin suggested eye-catching attractions: “If everyone had a bright coloured bike on the front of their shop the word would get out and people would think, ‘let’s go and see the bikes’. It doesn’t have to be a bike — it could be a milk churner or Christmas tree — but that way we could put details about our businesses out and make a bit of an attraction.”

Debbie added that Camelford ‘is in the middle of a wheel’, surrounded by Bodmin Moor and being close to the coast and popular locations of Tintagel and Boscastle. Kevin said: “Fifteen years ago I had never heard of Camelford — I only heard of Boscastle because of the floods!”

The group then moved onto online presence and how social media can help businesses thrive. Julie said: “I have gone through Instagram training and it’s interesting but you have to be very specific with it. I’d say Instagram is more interactive but I’m not convinced it’s as good as Facebook.”

Ayla, who admitted she runs four Instagram accounts, said: “We haven’t got business cards yet (at The Really Groovy Shop) but we have a lot of young people getting in touch with us online. We get repeat customers on Facebook and Instagram because they see something that we’ve posted on social media and they come running in.”

Kevin suggested that Ayla present a ten minute talk on social media and its benefits at the next meeting, and also added that he would like to get more guest speakers in to give advice and tips — including debt collecting, marketing, how to deal with customers causing trouble and more.

The Camelford Business Alliance will next meet on September 4, from 5.30pm to 7pm.