Students from LJMU’s Business School will represent the North West in a national competition after cleaning up with a hat-trick of awards thanks to their ethical soap business.
The Young Enterprise regional competition saw the six Level 5 BA (Hons) Business and Public Relations and BA (Hons) Accounting and Finance students win the Technology Award, supported by Barclays.
They also picked up the Best Business Plan Award, supported by Plexus Cotton, and Winning Finalist, supported by business law firm, DWF LLP, thanks to their ethical business, Organica.
They will now enter the Young Enterprise National Finals in London this May.
The ethical soap business was set up in September as part of the Graduate Enterprise module, which is supported by LJMU’s Centre for Entrepreneurship, and run in partnership with the national charity, Young Enterprise.
Project Manager at Organica, Pili Deus, spoke on behalf of the group about their achievements. She told JMU Journalism: “We wanted to choose something that we felt could carry on past The Young Enterprise competition – we were over the moon with our awards.
“The Barclays Technology [award] was really competitive. We thought of everything down to details of wages for our business plan, which helped with that award.
“The winning finalist award, which sees us compete in London at Nationals, was the cherry on top. There was so much competition; with a lot of techno and digital businesses so we couldn’t be sure where we would come.”
This is the third year in a row that LJMU students have got through to the national finals.
Janet Farrow, Module Leader for Graduate Enterprise and Programme Leader for the Business and Public Relations, told JMU Journalism: “I’m really pleased. This is such a good achievement as the North West Finals were very competitive.”
The team is now trying to expand to reach customers through local retailers and they are currently in talks with stores in Liverpool One to stock their soap.