Working in UKTI’s Consumer and Retail Sector Team, I am used to meeting well-known British brands, but it’s rare to be in a room with over 1,000 of them! Last week was an exception, when I attended the 2014 National Business Awards at the Grosvenor House Hotel. The awards celebrated UK enterprise excellence across 17 categories, with winners including J Sainsbury PLC, IKEA UK, Bulldog Skincare and Tangle Teezer.
The Prime Minister, David Cameron, gave the opening address and Olympic sailing champion Sir Ben Ainslie delivered a keynote speech. Impressionist and comedian Rory Bremner was on hand to provide entertainment for the evening. The awards received live coverage from the Telegraph and Sky News.
Finalists and winners covered a range of industries, including retail, advertising, technology and energy. I noticed that the awards recognised British companies of all sizes, with the smallest business celebrated on the night having an annual turnover of £23k and the largest reaching £20 billion.
UKTI hosted 2 tables on the night, with our Chief Executive Dominic Jermey presenting the UKTI Digital Business of the Year Award to Oxford-based company Electrocomponents PLC.
Electrocomponents PLC have a really interesting story. Today they are a world leading B2B distributor of electronics and maintenance products, but actually began their business journey in 1937 selling spare parts for radios in London! Today they serve over 1 million customers worldwide, have over 500,000 products in their range and ship around 44,000 parcels a day. It just goes to show how good UK companies are at taking their business to the next level through international trade.
It was also great to see the level of positive exposure UKTI received through supporting the awards. The launch video for UKTI’s e-Exporting Programme was shown during the awards ceremony; there was coverage in the delegate brochure and mentions in features written by the award’s media partners. The award ceremony gave me an opportunity to catch up with clients and a chance to network, discussing how UKTI can help UK companies achieve future business growth, particularly overseas.
It's so important we regularly celebrate British business excellence. I'd ask everyone working with UK-based companies to encourage them to nominate themselves for next year’s awards. Check out the national business awards website for more information.