Alison Provides Vital Companionship to Local Elderly Community Following Enterprise Hub Support

After working in banking for 25 years, Alison became increasingly uncomfortable with the changes she saw in the industry; finding their disregard of the older generation during the shift to digital banking particularly hard to deal with.

Alison Enhance Life's Qualities

After her mother was taken ill Alison realised first hand just how many older people are in need of support, so she decided to offer up her own solution to the problem; setting up Enhance Life’s Qualities, a companionship service for older people.

Alison explained: “Our services vary from light cleaning around the house, accompanying people to hospital appointments, making their breakfast or just keeping them company and having a chat. We help lots of different people including those with dementia by playing dominoes and helping them to keep their minds active.”

Alison was unsure about how to take that all-important first step into self-employment, so she came to St Helens Chamber’s Start Up team for help.

Alison explained: “I came to the Chamber and met up with Steve Mather from the Business Start Up team, he suggested I enrol onto business start-up workshops which were a great help as they gave me insight into what I needed to do at an early stage; up until that point I didn’t really know where to start.”

Steve Mather, Business Start-Up Adviser at St Helens Chamber added: “We both knew from the outset that this was a great business concept, this is a growing market which is only going to continue to grow. There was a real gap for a quality companionship service like Enhance Life’s Qualities and it’s great to see how the business is going from strength to strength in our meetings.”

After just a year and a half, demand for Alison’s services are growing and Enhance Life’s Qualities are offering more to their clients then ever before - such as a handyman service for smaller jobs around the house, courtesy of Alison’s partner.

Alison added: “We also now have a seven seater minibus to do days out with the older people. It helps the people who are lonely and may not get out much to make new friends and have new experiences.”

Not only are clients benefitting from the business’ growth, but Enhance Life’s Qualities are now recruiting for a new staff member!

Alison explained: “I have two people already working for the company on a self-employed basis, but demand is growing and we now need someone else to help us deliver our services across St Helens and Merseyside.

 “Without the help of the start-up team I might not have started the business and been at the point I am now, they gave me the direction I needed at that crucial early stage.”

You can find out more about Alison’s business at https://www.enhancelifesqualities.co.uk/

St Helens Chamber is part of Enterprise Hub, the enterprise gateway for business start-up support in the Liveprool City Region.  Offering expert advice and support to anyone thinking about starting a business, including help to:

• Understand the process of starting a business
• Research a business idea
• Build a comprehensive business plan
• Develop a marketing plan
• Create financial forecasts to understand the costs of running your business and potential income
• Identify sources of finance to get started

Enterprise Hub is part funded by the European Regional Development Fund.

For more information about the support available from St Helens Chamber to start a business, call 0845 340 9980 or email startup@sthelenschamber.com

For more information about Enterprise Hub in general contact enterprisehub@thewo.org.uk or 0151 706 8113.