Thorneywork Studio at Spring Fair 2013

Following previous tweets and blog post, I thought you might like to see some images from Thorneywork Studio's stand at this year's Spring Fair.

Francesca Duffield & her Thorneywork Studio stand at Spring Fair 2013

A close up of the Thorneywork Studio stand

'Ophelia' lamp from Thorneywork Studio

Francesca is a graduate of our Interiors & Lifestyle Futures Ventures' programme. You can read more about her here

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

D day: the four Ds of brand positioning

Interested in a short guide to branding? A book well worth tracking down is Paul Dickinson’s “It’s Not About Size: Bigger Brands for Smaller Businesses”, published by Virgin Books in 2001.

Here are the 4 Ds of effective brand positioning:

(1) Brand definition – telling the customer clearly what market the company is in.

(2) Clear differentiation – making sure the customer knows why the company’s offering is different and more beneficial to them.

(3) Deepening the brand – know as much as possible about the company’s customers and their goals and make sure the products and offerings are relevant to them.

(4) Defending the brand – small companies have to be flexible to compete with bigger brands. Review and evolve the brand over time.

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

What drives some high achievers?

Online college.org has a page summarising pieces of key advice that shaped 50 Famous Leaders. Here are 8 I’ve picked out.

1 Gen. David Petraeus: “Get out of your comfort zone.”

In the 1980s, a superior officer suggested Petraeus try something different intellectually, so he got a Ph.D. in international relations. The experience helped him become the top military officer in Afghanistan and director of the CIA.

2 C. Vivian Stringer: “Stand up for something or people will fall for anything.”

This women’s basketball Hall of Fame coach might never have had a career in sports if not for her father’s advice to fight for her place on a high school cheerleading squad, despite her skin color.

3 Tyra Banks: “Plan for the end at the beginning.”

She’s more than just a leading model; Banks also acts as CEO for her company, Bankable Enterprises. She learned from her mother that every project comes to an end and to always have a plan in mind for the next opportunity.

4 Bill Gross: “Two and two will always equal four.”

The fund manager of PIMCO’s $252 billion Total Return Fund claims the words of financier Bernard Baruch, who said there will never be a way to get something for nothing.

5 Howard Schulz: “Leave your ego at the door.”

The founder and chairman of Starbucks gleaned this wisdom from leadership guru Warren Bennis of USC. He learned to recognize skills in others to help him build a high-quality company.

6 George Soros: “Fight losing causes.”

Billionaire philanthropist and hedge fund manager Soros once met an anti-Communist dissident who told him he had spent his entire life fighting losing battles, which Soros believes sums up philanthropic work perfectly.

7 Bill Gates: “Keep things simple.”

This bit of advice was from one billionaire to another. Warren Buffett taught the Microsoft magnate to break things down and focus on the things that really count.

8 Reed Hastings: “Strategy is about what you’re not doing.”

Netflix founder and CEO Hastings has steered his company based on Jim Collins’ idea that having an effective strategy means making difficult decisions to not do things, rather than have a giant “to-do” list.

To read all 50 quotations please see here

Wendy Jones is part of Interiors & Lifestyle Futures, which provides business support to the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

Design 101: managing design at project level

Another in the teeny blog’s occasional series of basic design guides (and apologies to grannies who know all about those eggs)

Four project level design management tips

1. Always do your market research as part of the design process. The main reason for a design failing in the market place is not understanding customer requirements.
2. The early stages of the design process are the best time for change . They don’t cost too much.
3. Make sure you regularly review the design process against the design brief and specifications.
4. Keep track of all improvements/changes to processes and technical performance identified in the regular reviews and final evaluation. This will be of major benefit to future projects.

Four general planning tips 

1. Identify resource and equipment needs. For example, admin support, storage, technical information and external specialists.
2. Set key dates for specific objectives and tasks including start and finish dates. Plan design activities, establish overall targets for the design team and monitor progress.
3. Fix a project budget plan for all costs including any external funding elements.
4. Have an effective system of management information for control purposes with good communications in place.

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

Businesses that use external support are more likely to build the right foundations to survive and succeed

We would endorse that of course -  it's a quote from a report by Lord Young. It's included in Harriet Minter's 'Mentors, networking and professional advice - how they help your business' online article on the Guardian Small Business Network


Well, if you disagree (or agree) her article also includes an invitation to contribute  your say to a Q& A on Monday 25 June. 


One point that caught my eye, no just about  poked it out (!) is the claim that an astonishing 900,000 more businesses "could be created if the right spirit of entrepreneurship can be created in the UK", with the appropriate mentoring support.


Harriet's write up and details of the Q&A

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

7 etiquette essentials for networking

Corporate giant or one man/woman and their dog outfit, it doesn't matter. Networking is a fact of business life.

Connections expert Tony Altham has spoken at Interiors & Lifestyle Futures workshops before. Here's a reminder of his seven principles of networking success while you can find fuller details in the link below:

1. Rapport  - building rapport quickly is essential in building great relationship
2. Your handshake - match the pressure of the other person - don't crush, don't flounder like a wet fish
3. Respect & courtesy - regard the other person’s space and don’t get too close too soon
4. Certainty & conviction - strong and confident language will convey confidence and certainty
5. Etiquette - wait your turn to speak, avoid dominating a conversation. Instead, be the catalyst that draws other people into your group
6. Moving on - often at networking meetings you want to meet a number of people and the people you meet feel the same way. Acknowledge this and respect their time and yours
7.  Business cards - exchanging business cards is a simple activity that frequently has a big impact on how you are perceived

For the full details

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

5 reasons to visit the Birmingham Made Me Design Expo Friday 15 June- Friday 22 June

The Birmingham Made Me Design Expo kicks off next Friday (15 June) at The Mailbox in Birmingham. And, here are five reasons not to miss this week-long celebration of the best in Midlands design and innovation.

• It’s the first one and it’s telling a unique story - drawing together strands of design inspiration to create a unique platform for growth - featuring over 100 exhibitors from business and education in the Midlands.
• It’s all about design for everyone – thought provoking, inspirational, conversational, challenging.
• It’s been created and led by the region’s leading businesses, to pass on their unique experiences.
• It’s showcasing new talent, new design and providing inspiration for new collaborative opportunities. Many of them Interiors & Lifestyle Futures companies.
• The only cost of accessing this wisdom is your time!

Thanks to Charmaine Stint, Enterprise Development Manager at Birmingham City University

 For more see ilfutures blog and for a detailed programme Birmingham Made Me 

And, don't forget to call into the Entrepreneurs store

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at ILFutures

Olympic heroes - Bean2Bed

Three cheers for Bean2Bed who’ve landed a very cool deal to provide its bean bags, which convert to full size beds, for both the Jamaica and USA Olympic teams.

The company - an active member of the Interiors & Lifestyle Futures community  - will be providing specially-embroidered bean bags for both the Jamaica track and field team and USA athletics team’s training camps in Birmingham. 

Matt Roberts pictured, January 2012, on the Interiors & Lifestyle Futures' stand the UK  Interiors Show

Visit Bean2Bed

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

Five tips for growing your business with Twitter

Small businesses need to be making the most of Twitter.  Consumers are using it to search for services so any business ignoring Twitter is missing out on potential customer opportunities. That’s the upshot of research recently published by Orange Business.

And, their five Twitter tips (in summary) for growing your business:

1. "Mobilise your Twitter account: ...  makes it easier to respond to work requests … and allows you to make the most of any ‘dead time’ to see if people are shopping for your services.
2. Be prepared to offer advice: ... It’s not about giving away free counsel but showing you know what you’re talking about
3. Be quick ... If you don’t offer your services to somebody looking, your competitors will.
4. Reach out to communities of tweeters: The more networks you are engaged in … the fewer degrees of separation there will be between you and potential business leads.
5. Demonstrate ‘real-world’ credentials … link from your Twitter profile to a website that showcases your location, qualifications and credentials."

Click for the full story from Orange 

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

Obsession - because it's worth it*

The human instinct to collect is a natural one – an expression of individuality and yes of obsession. The big stuff, the famous pieces, the historical and the archaeological, get housed in galleries and museums to be admired by professionals, enthusiasts and tourists ducking the rain.

But, who gives voice to the personal collectors – of artificial grass, say, or Japanese guitars? Well, Helen and Graham Powell’s Obsessionistas is doing just that. The company, one of our recent ILF members, may only be a few months old but it has amassed a staggering online repository of design archives, collectors and their collections. It has also garnered serious attention from broadsheets, tabloids and glossy mags. 

Obsessionistas also hosts exhibitions of various collections – recently at the Milan Fair in April while y ou can catch them next at the Design Expo in June at Birmingham’s Mailbox.

If you have your own obsessive collection, Helen and Graham would love to hear from you.

On a personal note, talking of wonderful collections, if you are ever up in the North West, make sure you visit the Pencil Museum 

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

*I know that's Klein not L'Oréal!

Tight budget? Create a marketing strategy for free

In our workshops with small businesses, it is frequently clear that there is little if any budget for marketing. One thing they can do, points out Vanessa Merit Nornberg, is to develop a narrative that becomes a cost-free marketing strategy.

Vanessa suggests three overlapping options:

1. Tell your company story
2. Tell your product story
3. Tell your personal story

You can find Vanessa’s article here: why your story should be your marketing strategy

And, given story telling seem s to be a mini theme this week, don’t forget to check the post below for a critical take on  ‘making’ stories.

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

What's the point of a designer-maker video?

In our workshops, the concept of uploading a video to the designer-maker's website often arises. The aim is to tell the 'making' story and illustrate the craft involved, reinforcing the value of the end product. A justification of why this item costs more than a mass produced version.

Rob Walker's 'The Theater of Making' article takes a fairly critical approach to these videos - but he makes points that will be useful for anyone planning to make or remake such a video.Plus, he has links to several examples of the genre.

And, by the way, Design Observer, source of this article,is well worth  a regular read for anyone designing or interested in design.

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

Keep abreast in design by checking your Wallpaper daily

Wallpaper describes itself as the leading global design destination for showcasing all thats best in art, architecture, fashion, interiors and contemporary lifestyle. Check out their Watches and Jewellery Hub and their Lifestyles section. They also have a neat iPhone app.


Ken Thompson (aka The BumbleBee) blogs about bioteams, virtual collaboration and business simulation at www.bioteams.com.

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Design brief 101

You've thought of a new product or service and are keen to get it out there. But, remember most products fail due to poor market research. 


Of course, you'll create a design brief but, if it is going to work,  you must begin with four essential steps.

• a clear statement of the design opportunity, communicated with passion
• a definition of your target market (age, income level, gender, social group & geographic location)
• a run down of who your competition is 
• a concise profile of your ideal customer

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

Right here, write now - four+ tips for effective press releases

At a recent Visioning workshop,  a designer-maker asked about writing press releases. This blog isn’t the place for a lengthy how-to. A quick search on the Internet will give you lots of detailed advice (How to Write A Press Release for example )

 But, for a quick start here are my four basic tips*

• Make sure you know exactly what story you want to tell. It is surprisingly easy to fall into the trap of loading your news with irrelevant details.
• Aim for no more than 14 words in your opening sentence and tell everything concisely in your first paragraph – that’s all the editor may use. Make sure it answers these questions: Who, what, where when and how
• Check your spelling and grammar thoroughly – remember word processing spelling & grammar tools don’t think. They are weigh too dumb. See what I mean.
• Top it off with a clear and attention-grabbing headline but watch out for unintended meanings -  such as ‘Red Tape Holds Up New Bridge’

*This is the secret tip that’s rarely revealed. Forget the rules, type your story as it comes. Effective press releases aren’t written. Like all the best copy, they are rewritten. That's when, you won’t go far wrong with the tips above.

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

The strange tale of why aircraft toilets have ashtrays

Matt Simmons writes an excellent article with lots of helpful pictures , Engineering Infrastructures For Humans, on why aircraft toilets have ashtrays. In a nutshell Matt explains that airlines do not want us to smoke on flights and will do everything in their power to prevent this happening whilst airline regulators mandate that no commercial jet can take off without a fully functioning ashtray in all its lavatories. Disconnect? 
Matt concludes "That’s an awfully strange stance to take for a vehicle with such a stringent “no smoking” policy, but it really does make a lot of sense. Back in 1973, a flight crashed and killed 123 people, and the reason for the crash was attributed to a cigarette that was improperly disposed of. The FAA has decided that some people (despite the policies against smoking, the warning placards, the smoke detector, and the flight attendants) will smoke anyway, and when they do, there had better be a good place to put that cigarette butt!" 


So it actually makes perfect sense that aircraft toilets have ashtrays and is an example of the principle of good design known as affordance.

Ken Thompson (aka The BumbleBee) blogs about bioteams, virtual collaboration and business simulation at www.bioteams.com.

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100% design talent

Great write up about talented designers Plant & Moss in the promo material for this September's 100% Design.

 James Plant  and James Moss are part of the Interiors & Lifestyle Futures community and took part in the ILFutures-backed stand at the Interiors Show in January as well as our Celebration Exhibition at the School of Jewellery in March (see also our picture blog below).

If you are planning to go to 100% Design, make sure to call in on Plant &  Moss.

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

Pictures at an Exhibition

While Interiors & Lifestyle Futures plans its next outing as part of the Design Expo in June at the Mailbox, here's a short set of images from our third birthday celebration exhibition.

Click here to run images

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Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

Buzzing debut for Brum Made Me team

 Hailstorms and streets awash with rain did nothing to deter a throng from attending the debut of the Birmingham Made Me store on Tuesday evening. If anything, the buzz inside the Mailbox's newest retail venue was so great it threatened an electrical storm all of its own.

As executive dean of Birmingham Institute of Art and Design, Chris O'Neil said this venture by talented entrepreneurs, with strong support from the University's employability team, is an opening salvo in the forthcoming IDEA Birmingham Design Expo, which doesn't just rival anything London has to offer, it trounces it.

Interiors & Lifestyle Futures is delighted so many of its member companies are part of the Birmingham Made Me store. Go see all the companies* soon and often at the Mailbox. Bring your friends and your wallets!

A hot bed of West Midlands-based design talent, photo Ronald Gunawan

*Angela Burman Fine Arts, Bangers & Mash, Bonnie Lush Hair, Coco's Closet, Creative Lab, Grabkowska Applied Arts, HCF Boutique, Penelope Jordan,  Sara Page Design, Sit On My Face and Tiny Chair,


Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

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Small businesses can't win public contracts on their own

Interiors & Lifestyle Futures has previously reported on how SMEs are squeezed out when trying to win public sector contracts. Much was made last year of the Government’s determination to redress the balance. But, a report earlier this month from the Federation of Small Businesses makes clear that bantam businesses are still making little headway in the fight for a fair share of the public procurement pie.

One key finding chimes perfectly with our mantra about the advantages of like-minded companies collaborating:

“38 per cent believe the public sector should actively use small businesses or encourage consortia of small and medium sized firms where possible.”

Four issues a collaborative partnership can address in a procurement bid:

• turnover requirements
• professional indemnity
• required certifications
• currency of recent experience

Adrian Burns is part of a team supporting  the West Midlands community of interiors & lifestyle companies. Find out more at www.ilfutures.co.uk

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