With everyone having time off in the summer I think all companies begin to feel the strain a bit come August, for Spark we have all been very hard at work this month and have managed to get a lot completed before our holidays start.

Brian has been working extremely hard to get everyones pictures ready for all the local exhibitions which are now underway and Charlie has been trying to finish up all the steel jobs we have had in the pipeline. This has meant a lot of work for all the staff and volunteers.

The work has definitely been worth it with all our jobs now complete ready to start the next load. Last week myself and Roy went to Littlehampton to see the work of another social enterprise, homelink, I was very inspired by all their work and look forward to us being abe to work together and support each oher in the future.

Helen x

We are constantly responsible for a great deal of change ourselves here at Spark but its always nice when someone offers their time to give a helping hand. This is exactly what a group of B.A.T employees have done for us and the result is a magnificent area of our garden that everyone can be proud of! The centre piece to this garden is our 'Rise and Fall' fence which of course made up part of th Places of Change garden at Chelsea.

I would like to say a massive thankyou to B.A.T and in particular all the staff who came along and helped with the garden.

I hope everyone is taking advantage of the lovely weather and making the most of their gardens.

Helen

We have been very proud of the work the staff and volunteers at Spark have all put in to get us where we are today and it is lovely that this has been acknowldeged.

On Tuesday myself, Jon and Roy went to Reading for the Homeless Link conference where we had been nominated as one of four finalists for the Michael Whippman award. The award had over 60 applicants so we were very pleased to get this far.

The Michael Whippman award is awarded to the social enterprise that best involves homeless people and empowers them to make a contribution, is aspiring entrepreneurial and profit making and can demonstrate its impact on society.

On the day Jon and Roy were very brave in carrying out a dragons den style pitch to explain the work of Spark and the judges all seemed very impressed. The audience however made the final vote and went with a different group. Despite this it was lovely to be able to get out and explain about the great work we have been doing.

Congratulations to the Sandwich people for winning the award and thankyou again to Roy for attending the conference with us.

I hope everyone is enjoying their summer,

Helen x

Chelsea flower show is now in full swing and has proved to be a huge sucess for the places of Change garden which housed the fence and arches made by Spark. The garden won a silver medal which is fantastic and makes us all extremely proud to have been a part of it, it is also great as it means that more people are becoming aware of the great causes we have all been working for.

Myself and some of the service users were up at Chelsea yesterday and I couldnt believe how big it was. It was certainly impressive and there were a lot of people very keen to here about our work so I reckon we might be getting busier and busier which is brilliant!

Alongside all the excitment of the flower show it has still been business as usual and myself and the service users have been working very hard to get the gallery ready for our first exhibitions in the middle of the summer. There has been a lot of paint over clothes and in hair but it is definitely begining to take shape. All we are waiting on now is our carpet!

Thanks to Charlie our entrance hall is now revamped with a nice, bright, summery floor.

I hope you have all been enjoying the sun, it was much welcomed by myself, I just hope it stays with us now especially with the approaching bank holiday weekend.

I will let you know how we get on with the carpet soon. Have a great weekend!

Helen

Hi everyone,

With the year quickly disappearing before my eyes I thought it was time I introduced myself, I am Helen Gregory and I have been employed to help implement the sales strategy for Spark. I will be taking care of customer service and our developing our customer base, delivering sales pitches and running the shop. As I am sure you will all be aware we have been doing a lot of ongoing work to improve our shop- I seem to have a paint brush permanently glued to my hand, but now it is all definitely beginning to pay off and I would be great to meet you and for everyone to be able to see exactly what it is we can do. Alongside developing the shop we have also been getting our exhibition area ready (more painting and decorating) and we are now just waiting for the carpet.It has all been hectic down here this last week, everyone seems to be having exhibitions so Brian has been kept busy framing the artwork ready for them and with Chelsea flower show fast approaching Charlie and the volunteers have worked very hard to get our piece ready to take up in a couple of weeks time. It has definitely been worth the hard work though as it looks fantastic! I hope you have all been enjoying the lovely weather, fingers crossed it will hold out for the bank holiday weekend!

Helen