A Derby business says it will use money received from a government grant to help grow organisations in the city and boost the local economy.
Visual marketing agency Briight are recipients of an Innovate UK grant that was made available to “develop and realise the potential of new ideas, including those from the UK’s world-class research base.”
Directors Rob Dawes and Drew Taylour-Davis will use the money – almost £30,000 – to make a creative impact on the area.
“The demand on digital and creative industries is huge right now,” said Rob, who has been running an agency with Drew for more than eight years.
“We want our studio in Jubilee Business Park to be a creative hub. We want to be able to develop our studio space to increase our capacity and scale of projects, and be a fully functional space that will be hired out to other businesses and creatives in need of a large flexible filming space.”
Rob and Drew have worked with some popular local businesses as well as campaigns for household names, including the BBC, Microsoft, and, most recently, HECK; the North Yorkshire-based supplier of sausages to most major supermarkets.
They want to share their expertise with the next generation of creatives and creative entrepreneurs by giving local people work experience that could eventually lead to permanent roles within the company.
Drew added: “Our ambition at Briight is to host a creative space that can help nurture talent and produce great work.
“We want to push people locally to be more ambitious, understand the power of great visual marketing, and apply it at all levels.”
The pair believe that post-covid, most young people in the creative industries are wanting a base from which to work and the latest statistics from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) back this up.
From September 2022 to January 2023, there was a rise in hybrid working among 35-44 year-olds, who were the most likely to work hybridly. However, 65% of 16-24 year-olds said that they couldn’t work from home, citing reasons including lack of home-office space and equipment.
Drew said: “Most companies gave up their office space after covid but for creative businesses like ours, it’s still essential for growth and development.
“Creatives need that space and those colleagues who they can bounce ideas off. We’ll use the grant to help us make our workspace even more of a fun and inspiring place to be and somewhere that we can organically grow our team.”
