Newark Business Club Meeting Write-Up – 1 May 2026
Emma Holden, the new chair of Newark Business Club, welcomed around 80 local businesspeople to Newark Business Club’s May meeting. She announced some changes to the meetings’ format, including a slightly longer coffee break to extend networking opportunities and a new feature named ‘Club Connections’ recognising and celebrating connections made within the Club. Feedback on Newark Business Club’s new website, developed by Xposure Creative, was invited.
The recently upgraded website includes a booking platform that allows members and visitors to book meeting tickets without using a third party and future features include a membership directory to help encourage businesses to use local suppliers in and around the Newark area.
The roving mic travelled around the room, giving all attendees the opportunity to introduce themselves and their businesses, showcasing the diversity of businesses in the Newark area.
Meeting Sponsors – HiPer Business Solutions
Gaz Cresswell, CEO of HiPer Business Solutions, gave an insight into how HiPer helps businesses to modernise their operating systems, increasing efficiency, reducing costs and facilitating better decision making.
HiPer Business Solutions’ three-step process begins with an audit of the business’s current systems using HiPer’s own auditing software. This uses five audit pillars to understand how data is collected, managed and used, allowing the current systems’ issues to be understood. For example, a business may have outdated or disconnected systems that have evolved over many years, leading to issues such as duplicated data, spreadsheet chaos and missed follow-ups, which in turn can result in hidden costs, frustration among the workforce and unclear decision making. These issues make it difficult to scale a business.
The second stage of the process involves creating better operating systems that meet each business’s exact needs, serving it well in the current environment, while the third stage concerns evolving those systems as the business grows through better reporting, smarter automation, stronger controls and joined-up processes, creating resilient and future-proof systems.
The Business Card Draw
Next on the agenda was the business card draw. Keith Lockwood of Retail Outcome, a first-time visitor, won a write-up in the club’s newsletter, while Lucy Painter of FundingRound, a regular attendee, won a write-up in the Newark Advertiser.
2 Minute Spotlight!
Darren Bowles of Epona Solutions Ltd spoke about how his company helps small and medium-sized businesses and charities to solve a variety of software-related business problems, including migrations, performance issues and leveraging AI.
Who Gives a Book?!
This month’s inspiring business book, Leadership 101: Don’t Be a D*ck! written by regular Newark Business Club member Andy Nisevic was recommended by Emma Holden. John Scaysbrook of Sherwood Healing won a copy of this book.
Club Connections
Club Connections is a new segment of the business club’s meetings in which tables are chosen at random, and one person from each table describes an important new connection they made at Newark Business Club and why. Specific projects and collaborations were mentioned as well as business relationships and friendships that developed following initial meetings at Newark Business Club.
Taking Action on Behalf of the Town!
Michael Hardy was thanked for his contributions to Newark Business Club over the years as he has stepped down as a committee member and chair of the Action Group in order to focus on other ventures.
Events
Among the closing announcements were several events:
- The Knife Angel, a 27-foot-tall sculpture made from over 100,000 confiscated knives to raise awareness of the devastating impact of knife crime and violence, has arrived in Newark Market Place and will remain there until May 20. Accompanying the Knife Angel’s visit, We Are Newark has organised a 30-day programme of events. Full details of the events can be found at: https://newark-sherwooddc.gov.uk/knifeangel/programme-of-events
- The Strategy & Subconscious Workshop, presented by Andy Nisevic of One Degree Training and Coaching and Charlotte Mather of The Health Barn at Hockerton, will be held on 20 May and 15 June. The workshop aims to give coaches, therapists and healers clarity on what to focus on over the next three months and the emotional tools to take action.
- Collingham-based Gusto Group is organising Gusto Fest, a summer celebration incorporating live music, food, drink, activities and a screening of the England vs Panama World Cup match, on 27 June. Corporate packages and individual tickets are available.
- Combining networking with supporting local independent restaurants, the Newark Dining Network will meet at Thai Sabai in Stodman Street, Newark, on 8 July. Book your place on Eventbrite.
- Registration is open for teams to enter The Dragon Boat Race on 13 September at https://newarkdragonboatfestival.co.uk/register Now in its sixth year, the race benefits two local charities: Beaumond House Hospice Care and The Children’s Bereavement Centre.
Business Support and Training
East Midlands Chamber is offering free training courses for businesses based in Newark and Sherwood. For further information, contact Ryan Cragside: ryan.cragside@emc-dnl.co.uk Newark & Sherwood District Council will hold a Business Support Surgery on 10 September. Business owners are invited to book a free 60-minute meeting with business adviser Dawn Fear. For bookings and further information, email Will Parkinson: will.parkinson@newark-sherwooddc.gov.uk
Member Spotlight – Lucy Painter, FundingRound
WHY LOCAL BUSINESS STILL MATTERS (AND ALWAYS WILL)
There’s always something refreshing about walking into a room full of local business owners at 7am in Newark. There are no gimmicks, scripts or over-engineered agendas, just real conversations with local business owners who want to build and grow. They navigate and share business challenges day in, day out. That’s exactly what Newark Business Club meetings deliver consistently.
In a world where everything is becoming more digital, more remote, and often more transactional, there is real value in face-to-face business communities. Not just for swapping business cards, but for building trust. And in our world, trust isn’t a ‘nice to have’; it’s essential. It is at the very basis of our business.
As a commercial finance broker, we spend a lot of time getting into the detail of businesses. That means understanding numbers, yes, but also understanding the people behind them. Their ambitions, their pressures, and sometimes the barriers that have stopped things moving forward. Those conversations don’t start with a spreadsheet; they start with a trusted relationship. That’s where local networks like Newark Business Club really come into their own.
You’ll often find that the conversation over a coffee leads to something far more meaningful. A business owner sharing that they’ve outgrown their premises but aren’t sure what the next step looks like, or another who’s been told “no” by their bank and assumed that was the end of the road. Or it may be a business owner who has an opportunity but unsure how to fund it without taking unnecessary risk.
We hear stories like these all the time. And the reality is, most of these situations can be solved with the right approach.
The lending landscape has shifted over the last few years. It is not always straightforward, and there certainly isn’t one size that fits all, but there is appetite out there for good, well-structured deals. The challenge for many businesses is knowing where to start, and which route actually gives them a realistic chance of success.
That’s where our experience can really make a difference. It’s not about pushing finance where it doesn’t fit. It is however, about understanding what’s possible, what’s sensible, and how to position a business in the right way to get a positive outcome. The business owner can concentrate on their day job whilst we do this.
What events like Newark Business Club do brilliantly, is create the environment for those conversations to happen naturally and build genuine connections that often lead to something more over time.
And that’s the point. Business, especially at a local level, still runs on relationships. If you’re a business owner in the area and haven’t been along, it’s worth experiencing it for yourself. You might meet a new client, a new supplier, or simply have a conversation that changes your thinking. And if that conversation happens to be about funding, growth, or what’s actually possible for your business right now, then we’re always happy to have that chat.
Lucy Painter, Director – FundingRound Ltd
01636 557460 | www.fundinground.co.uk
Thank you to Our Patrons & Sponsors
We are delighted to announce the following Patrons for 2025: Gusto Group|GXO in Partnership with Currys|Barcode Warehouse|PeachyEvents|Radio Newark
Next meeting
The next meeting of Newark Business Club will be on 5th June at the YMCA, doors open from 6.45am. Write up by Roz Andrews, RA Writers For Hire/RA Book Editing. Photos supplied by Nicola Auckland Brand Photography.
