What a day we had at the Club Hub Awards 2022 on Saturday 14th June in Birmingham. The day was hosted by Tessa Robinson the Founder and Director of Club Hub UK It was amazing to see finalists from across the UK with their friends and family along with other Children’s Activity providers, coming together to celebrate success.

The day was started with an ice breaker led by Stacey Calder who got us all playing a game of get to know you ‘bingo’ then guest speaker Lucy Ferguson took to the stage to talk about all things google. This was a great session on how to get found online. It’s one of the things I teach in my Market Like A Pop Star programme.

Lunch was a perfect opportunity to network, catch up with old friends and make new ones and the food was pretty tasty too.

After lunch it was my turn to take the stage and I did with a bang! No sleeping on my watch, cue The Venga Boys and we were ready to party. If you have ever been to Mess Around you would know this song. It’s my signature finale and its always guaranteed to get everyone moving.

With everyone full of energy we dived into my presentation. I talked about my business journey

• How I fell into franchising, what I learned on the way
• How I made my business stand out from the crowd
• Why it’s important to build solid foundations from the beginning
• Why you need to invest in your business
• Why it’s important to create that memorable experience
• Why you need a marketing system in this fast paced era, which is customer centred
• The Market Like A Pop Star Challenge was officially launched

After some champagne it was time for the Awards and what an afternoon it was of celebrating success. I was delighted to Sponsor the Leader of the Year Award.

Leader of the Year (Someone who manages a team of people, whether that is someone who is head of a franchise or any business in the kids activities industry. This person must have been managing this same team for more than 3 years).

And the Finalists were:

• Claire O’Connor – babyballet
• Carly Pryke – Fixation Academy of Performing Arts
• Anna Neville – Kidslingo
• Claire Munday – Tappy Toes
• Cate Blackmore – WestWay School of Performing Arts

This award must had been a tough category to judge, with so many great leaders. It was amazing to present the Award to Claire O Connor from babyballet and truly inspirational woman.

babyballet Founded in Halifax in 2005, babyballet is an early years dance and ballet programme for boys and girls from 6 moths to 6 years focused on building confidence, inclusivity and having fun. Claire O’Connor started the company with an idea and a whole lot of passion to improve every child’s physical, emotional, educational and social development.

The brand & business has grown to also include: classes, parties, events, entertainment, uniform, merchandise, children’s characters, shows, DVD, music, Children’s book.

It has achieved impressive growth and now has 86 franchisees across the UK running around 2,000 classes a week for 25,000 children. The company has also gone global with 27 licensees in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore.

The company YouTube channel itself has reached over 4,500,000 views which shows just how popular and engaging babyballet® is!

It was such an amazing day to be part of and if you didn’t enter the awards this year, then its definitely one to be part of in 2023. Stay tuned for details on when doors open for nominations. In the mean time read my blog on Why Awards are Great for Business.