Womanpreneur of the Year 2011

Sponsored by Allison Marlowe, founder of The Hampshire Winning Women Business Awards

• Aycin Wateridge   http://www.b-organic.co.uk

Aycin created a range of organic skin care and bath range for babies and adults, following the birth of her daughter who was born with severe eczema.

Aycin identified that they was currently nothing on the market that was gentle enough without all the nasty chemicals or replaced by SLS and Parabens.

By sourcing high end certified organic plant derived ingredients, she teamed up with industry professionals and developed a full range that was so gentle it produced excellent results in a very short space of time. B-Organic Skincare was created on a shoe-string budget and has now generated interest from the likes of High street stores and major investors.

Aycin’s passion for her product and love for her daughter was the driving force to the success of B-Organic Skincare and overwhelmed to the judges, with her high energy and enthusiasm and this stood out throughout the judging process. B-Organic Skincare launched 27th June 2010 and has already won many accolades and awards.

Conquering Adversity

Sponsored by Morph PR

• Ann Carver    http://www.heybigspenders.co.uk/

Ann founded Hey Big Spenders after a difficult period in her life, where she had experienced several traumas in succession, which resulted in Ann’s spending habits spinning out of control.

Her spendaholism pushed Ann to re-evaluate her own life process and through her own adversity she created a necessary business to help other to ‘get to grips’ with impulse spending habits and behaviors that trigger the problem. Not only has Ann created workshops to address the fundamental issues but has also developed innovative simple tools and products to enforce her techniques.

Ann created her business with ‘no money’ but with determination and sheer drive to make a differences she eventually secured some funding from UnLtd to prove that Hey Big Spenders works!

Ann Founded Hey Big Spenders in April 2010 and has already generated interest from Hampshire County Council and Hampshire School for Social Entrepreneurs.

Business Mum Extraordinaire

Sponsored by Dress Rehearsal

• Sally Thompson   http://www.jiggywrigglers.com/

With 3 small children under the age of three, Sally indentified that there was a lack of affordable quality groups in her area, especially for families with multiple children it was expensive to engage in fun stimulating activities, so she set about creating Jiggy Wrigglers.

Motivated by a strong desire to be a good mum and role model to her daughters, she also engaged other mums to initiate their own affordable groups under her direction and business model and so the seedlings of a UK franchise opportunity was born, but with desires to grow Global. With a ethos of pay per family not per child the concept attracted many customers. Jiggy Wrigglers was created by a mum, run by mums, for mums and their children love it. Her team have the perfect balance between a rewarding well paid job and a great family life.

The Jiggy Wrigglers brand was hatched in July 2008 and currently has 9 employees, all inspired by Sally who had the vision and created a company simply working part-time.

New Business Venture

Sponsored by My Virtual Concierge
Two awards were given this in category

New Business Venture.

• Louise Lloyd   http://www.babysigningmummy.com/

After leaving a top London hospital as a paediatric nurse, Louise wanted a ‘role’ that would allow her to work flexibly around her family, with hours to suit her needs as a mummy, without sacrificing one position for another.

Her biggest challenge was the initial decision to take the plunge in setting up her own business. Her passion for child-development and communication between mother and child, found Louise orchestrating a new sign language method for babies by combining the very best of two developed techniques. She finely tuned this method using her previous knowledge from her nursing background and Babysigningmummy was born.

Louise’s passion is easier to convey by quoting her “ I am the Baby Signing Mummy and my love and passion for all things related to communication, child development and babies shines through on everything that I do”. Launched in February 2010, Baby Signing Mummy has seen exponential growth with established workshops, products and a Qualification Teaching Package.

Her new Guild of Teachers and predicted franchises, sets Louise on a path of outstanding Success.

New Virtual Business

• Sharon Armstrong   http://www.babytod.co.uk/

Sharon identified a gap in the Early Years market place and developed a one-stop-shop in the form of a website and print voucher directory. Being aware of the impact of the current UK financial climate, Sharon wanted to collate information in one easy accessible place for families to save money without compromising on quality.

With interest from Mothercare, Butlins, JoJo Mamanbebe and Hampshire County Council, her site grows daily with unique visitors driven by the big names that reach out to her audience.

BabyTod began trading in April 2010 and rapidly grew across Hampshire and West Sussex. Sharon has big plans to roll BabyTod across the UK as a branded virtual service.

BabyTod discounts and offers are a massive incentive to families as seen and mentioned on numerous occasions on Martin Lewis’ Money Saving Expert website.

Networking Champion

Sponsored by Booked PR

• Sam Russell   http://www.thesocialsardine.com/

After running a web design company for three years Sam realized it was time to do something different and that something had to be something she loved doing.

When she realized her passion lay in social networking and ultimately in teaching others how to get involved and how to connect with each other so easily using these business tools her new business was founded.

Sam has created a specific niche by specialising in helping others use Facebook as a platform to communicate both socially and for business.

She is keen to learn from the top and has invested in studying with social media expert Mari Smith from the USA.

Sam brings cutting edge information straight from the States and is currently writing her first book.

The Heart Award

New for 2011, the Heart award was introduced as a reflection of the woman behind her business.

• Wendy Wyatt   http://www.wendywyatt.co.uk/

Wendy was recognised as someone who lives life loving what she does and does what she loves. She has never been employed in her life, instead has chosen to run her own businesses which she has done for nearly 30 years.

Wendy lives by her values and has over the years overcome adversity, continues to be a business mum extraordinaire and most definitely a winning women.

The testimonials that accompanied Wendy’s nomination form spoke for themselves.