"Bradford the Best City in the Country to start a Business"

Bradford City Park

Author Jonfarman

Licence Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 unported

Jane Lambert

According to The Business Desk, Bradford Telegraph & Argus and Yorkshire Post, Bradford is the best city in the UK to start a business. I have not yet found the source of those reports even though I have been googling away all morning but they all quote a Barclays’ SME Growth Factors Index. Apparently the index compares the strength of 12 key growth factors such as business rate relief, infrastructure, broadband speed and labour productivity and Bradford comes out top on road connectivity, job vacancies, commercial rents and business rate relief.

Now the first thing to say is congratulations to Bradford and its people. The city has many strengths such as a fine university, the Alhambra theatre, St George's Hall now undergoing refurbishment, the Science and Media Museum, Salts Mill, Cartwright Hall and some strong businesses in manufacturing, financial services and retailing. It is the first UNESCO city of film and its city centre has recently been rejuvenated by the City Park shown above and the new Broadway shopping centre.

However, the very factors that placed Bradford on top, namely  job vacancies, low rents and rate supports, also suggest that there are a lot of people looking for work as well as a lot of empty premises waiting for tenants. As for Bradford's road connectivity, it may get high marks for the M606's starting close to the city centre but anyone from the south of the city struggling to catch a flight at Yeadon will have been less than impressed with the ring road. It is much easier for folk in my corner of Kirklees to reach Ringway, Doncaster or even Speke by road even though Yeadon is closest as the crow flies. I would add that there is also a direct rail link from Huddersfield to the airports at Manchester and Liverpool but there is not even a rail link to Leeds or Bradford from what is officially called the Leeds Bradford International Airport.

Also, many of the most successful startups nowadays are knowledge intensive and knowledge requires protection, careful nurturing and strategic commercialisation.  The folk who are best help with that are intellectual property specialists, that is to say attorneys, specialist lawyers and business advisers. According to the Office for National Statistics there were 528,155 inhabitants in Bradford but there appear to be no firms of patent attorneys in the city. When I entered the address of Bradford University into the CIPA "Find a Patent Attorney" form I found none within 10 or even 15 miles of the city centre. The nearest was in Halifax followed by a few more in Leeds.  Considering that Bradford even has a street near Lister's Mill called "Patent Street" that is surprising.

Now I can help with IP and indeed I have helped many businesses in the city over the last 20 years. I can help those with an idea for a new product of process (see Service for Inventors) and those establishing themselves in the market place (see Services relating to Branding) as well as established businesses and investors. Should anyone in Bradford or elsewhere wish to discuss any of those issues call me on 020 7404 5252 or send me a message through my contact form.

What could be done with the Bradford Odeon

Bradford Odeon in 1937 Source Wikipedia

The Bradford Odeon is a magnificent building set between the Alhambra Theatre and The National Media Museum in one of England's handsomest cities. Like much of that great city the Odeon has seen better days. It closed in 2000 and by at least one account it is in a terrible state of repair (see Will Kilner "Former Odeon 'unsafe' says survey", Bradford Telegraph & Argus, 29 Sept 2008. There have been calls to pull it down - even though there is already a massive derelict area of the city centre where a shopping centre was supposed to be - and the building has been saved largely by the efforts of BORG (Bradford Odeon Rescue Group), its allies and supporters.

Recently the burghers of Bradford enjoyed two bits of good news. First their football team won an important match at Wembley (BBC Sport 18 May 2013). Secondly, the local authority has acquired the Odeon for £1 (Rachel Covill "Odeon set to transfer to the Council" The Business Desk 1 May 2013). The question that now arises is what should be done with that magnificent building.

Here is my suggestion offered tentatively by an outsider albeit a good friend and neighbour of the city of Bradford. How about turning the building into an arts centre to celebrate the cultural diversity of your great city?  There is a model for such a centre in Tottenham (another community with a rich cultural diversity and a football club) namely the Bernie Grant Arts Centre.  

I visited the Centre last Saturday with a friend from Bradford who was already in London  for the football. I was there for to see Ballet Black as I greatly prefer ballet to the spectacle of 22 men and a ref chasing a ball around a field - a tedious exercise if ever there was one. You can see my review of the performance in "Why Ballet Black is Special" Terpsichore 20 May 2013.

Ballet Black performed in a very comfortable auditorium - by which I mean there was plenty of leg room - but there was much more to the Centre than that. There was a restaurant called the Blooming Scent, serving jollof rice from West Africa, jerk chicken from Jamaica and chips from London, whose proprietor, Gina Moffatt, has been honoured by the Prince of Wales and an enterprise centre with plenty of interesting local businesses. 

Now that I am spending a lot of time in London I hope to get to know the Centre and offer it my support in the way that I have supported entrepreneurs in Yorkshire with clinics, clubs, newsletters and blogs like this. But I shall never forget where I have come from.   If ever the transformation of the Odeon building - or any other Bradford business - needs the sort of help and advice I can offer I and my colleagues will be there for it.  And I now have lots of great colleagues to help me.  

If anyone wants to discuss this article call me on 0113 320 3232 or 01484 599090 or fill in my contact form. You can also follow me on Facebook, Linkedin, twitter or Xing.