Businessman awaits decision on his vision for prime city centre site
An entrepreneur with plans to transform an old Gloucester pub sitting in the middle of a multi-million pound city centre development is still waiting on a crucial council decision.
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Dear Readers,
Welcome to another members’s edition of The Raikes Journal. It’s been quite a week. Today we were at the offices of a firm many of you will know very well, as we gathered comments ahead of an article which will reveal the business as our latest Founding Partner.
And we were chatting to one of our other Founding Partners, Gloucestershire College, about another special announcement - a piece of news it is due to unveil on Thursday coming at Hub8 in Cheltenham as part of CyNam’s regular Cyber Sips events.
We’ll report on it here for you, if you can’t make it along.
All that and the story yesterday, about one of the firms featured in our rolling Top 100 Businesses in Gloucestershire series, sponsored by Randall & Payne, which follows the financial fortunes of the county’s biggest firms by turnover. Its most recent results show its turnover passed a cool £1 billion.
As this is a member’s only edition we feature another Top 100 story below, about a Stonehouse firm whose net profits - we kid you not - have jumped by 2,800 per cent plus.
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Why today’s main story?
We thought it was about time we caught up with one of the names we know are in the running to take over a former city centre pub in Gloucester that finds itself empty and yet at the heart of multi-million pound redevelopment scheme. In short, it’s in a great spot.
We focus on this businessman because he’s from the city, and he is the relative minnow up against some much bigger businesses - and because the nervous wait he’s enduring will be known by anyone who had ever tried working to a time frame and had to get approval from a local authority before their plans can go ahead for real.
What it also shows is just how much Gloucester City Council’s efforts to regenerate the city are transforming how people see its potential, and whatever the outcome of the wait outlined above, that surely bodes well for its future.
We hope you enjoy the read. Have a great weekend.
Your Raikes’ briefing
📚 On Monday we went big on an interview with Paul James. James spent two decades at the heart of projects to encourage the regeneration of his home city and he’s now written it all down in a book which tracks the story from the dark days when no developer would go near the city to the emerging waterside university city we see today. That book is officially launched today (Friday) at 7pm at the Parliament Room, Gloucester Cathedral. Read the full interview here.
🦷 We delivered one for you yesterday – a report on one of the firms featured in our rolling Top 100 Businesses in Gloucestershire series – and now we’re doing it again. Today the firm happens to have recorded a leap in net profit of more than 2,840 percent. Yes, that’s right! You can find out who we are talking about via the link at the end of this note. Read more here.
🎯 Randall & Payne is staging this event on April 25 from 6pm to 8.30pm - inviting teams to step up to the ocke and take on all-comers. It’s a winner takes all darts competition in aid of charity. A £30 entry fee will secure your place in a league format with a guarantee of at least three games. All money raised will go to its charity of the year, Teckels animal charity, which rescues cares for, rehabilitates and rehomes cats and dogs. Contact Jo Kline at marketing@randall-payne.co.uk.
Businessman awaits decision on his vision for prime city centre site
An entrepreneur with plans to transform an old Gloucester pub now sitting in the middle of a multi-million pound city centre development tells us what it’s like waiting on a crucial council decision.
By Andrew Merrell
Enthusiasm still reigned supreme for his plans to transform a former Gloucester pub into a cool cafe and bar - ‘something worthy of what the city is fast-becoming’ - but perhaps the frustration of waiting were beginning to show.
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