New Chairman and Presidents at StartUp Croydon

StartUp Croydon has appointed Fintan O’Toole as Chairman

Fintan has been a trustee of the Charity for three years and is a prominent member of Croydon’s business community.  He is a member and past Chairman of Croydon Chamber of Commerce and runs his own company, The HR Dept, which has been supporting Croydon businesses for over 10 years.

Outgoing Chairman, David Robinson, has been appointed President and will continue to play an active part in the venture.  He oversaw the successful move to Weatherill House where StartUp Croydon rebranded and adopted charitable status.  Last year StartUp Croydon delivered 3,000 hours of training and 130 hours of mentoring to nearly 300 individuals helping people, many of them unemployed, to realise their dreams of starting and running their own business.

Geoffrey Dove, who along with Bernard Weatherill, founded Croydon Business Venture over 35 years ago has been appointed Honorary Life President in recognition of his continued service to the Charity and small businesses in Croydon.  Geoffrey is delighted that 80% of participants on Start Up Croydon’s well established, three day programme felt better prepared and more confident about starting their own business.

StartUp Croydon is looking to continue supporting as many people as we can through training, 1-1 mentoring and the provision of affordable accommodation and business support services for the new start-up and early stage business to help them to survive and eventually grow. Its recently published impact report (attached) sets out what we have achieved so far this year and what we plan to achieve with the growth of our charity and expansion of our programmes.