There was a brilliant turnout for Connecting Biz at Highfield Park (From Hampshire Chronicle)
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Connecting Biz brought more than 100 Basingstoke businesses together at Highfield Park
9:32am Tuesday 5th March 2013 in Hampshire Business By Richard Garfield
L-R: Highfield Park sales manager LynnHames, general manager Kirsty Ewart and Barbara Payne, from Digital Design Agency
MORE than 100 people attended last week’s Connecting Biz networking event in one of north Hampshire’s hidden gems, Highfield Park.
The monthly networking meeting is organised by Basingstoke radio station The Breeze and Tadley-based Digital Design Agency.
Kirsty Ewart, who is the general manager at Highfield Park, invited Connecting Biz to the hotel in Heckfield, after attending last month’s event held at The Ark Conference Centre.
Kirsty, who has been in the hotel industry for 22 years, said: “It’s the best-run networking event that I have ever been to and that is why we decided we wanted to host it here.
“I feel that everyone gets a good two minutes to be able to express their business rather than you going back to the same people time and time again.”
At The Ark event, Kirsty networked with Iain Cameron, director of income generation at St Michael’s Hospice.
And following on from their meeting, staff at Highfield Park have agreed to support the Basingstoke hospice as their chosen local charity of the year.
Last week’s event certainly worked wonders in publicising the 58-bedroom hotel among the business community.
“When we were at The Ark, we discovered that there were so many people who didn’t know about us – yet we are only 15 minutes from Basingstoke,” said Kirsty.
Sue Reynolds, station manager at The Breeze, said Connecting Biz events have been taking place in the Basingstoke area for around a year.
She added: “It’s been a phenomenal success – it’s got bigger than I imagined it would be and I really feel proud of it. It’s about working together for the good of the area.”
The event is free to attend, although attendees are asked to make a donation towards The Breeze Kids Trust charity, The next event is set to take place at The Apollo Hotel, in Basingstoke, on March 21.
