JANUARY 2025
Welcome to the first edition of 2025 of Bradford Means Business, or as I should call it Bradford Means BUSINESSiQ magazine. This slight change in our brand to bring together the brand title for all three of our business magazines we publish in the Yorkshire and the North East.
As always, this magazine is dedicated to showcasing the positive impact of local business in the Bradford district and acts a positive barometer for the local business community.
We have to start with Bradford Council telling us that Bradford’s year as UK City of Culture 2025 is “nothing short of a game-changer”. RISE, the event that kickstarted a 12-month City of Culture programme of events taking place across the district, was an incredible success, despite the arctic chill! More than 20,000 of us came out to witness RISE, and I was incredibly proud to see Bradford put on such a positively uplifting event, then though my toes were not so thankful at the time.
We also delve into sport in our city and the continued great work going on at the Bradford Bulls, with Jason Hirst, CEO of Bradford Bulls telling us about the colleagues, a vast army of dedicated volunteers and hugely supportive commercial partners and sponsors who make him feel extremely proud to be a custodian of Bradford’s great club. He talks about on-field successes and how the Bulls are targeting promotion back to the Super League.
To cap it all off, we take a look at some of the incredible Bradfordians who have been recognised in this years New Year’s Honours list.
Enjoy, and see you with our next edition just ahead of UKREiif in the spring.
October 2024
Welcome to the autumn edition of Bradford Means Business. Can you believe that at the time I penned this welcome we are only 10 weeks away from our year as City of Culture, a very exciting time for the district and in readiness in this final edition of the year we delve into the reopening of National Science and Media Museum with them featured on the cover and inside you can see the results of the hard work gone into their impressive refurbishment.
In this issue we also meet Aqualand, who design and manufacture fun products for the leisure industry. We visit Pennine Cycles, a successful bike shop which traces its history back to just after the end of the Second World War and ask them about the secrets to their longevity.
Bradford Means Business discovers the wealthy history of the City’s Little Germany quarter.
As we enter the final two months of 2024 and the excitement builds around 2025, the city centre has had a particular busy 12 months, recently we saw Primark move into The Broadway, followed by additional retailers taking up vacant units, whilst the bus lanes are now rerouted around the back of The Broadway making access even easier.
We’ve seen the pedestrianisation across to City Park, the old NCP car park disappear from the skyline and the last piece of scaffold removed from Bradford Live, the city centre is certainly looking different to when I wrote this column 12 months ago.
Enjoy the read, and see you in January!
July 2024
Welcome to the summer edition of Bradford Means Business, it’s been a busy time here in Bradford and the district. Since we published our spring edition, we went en masse to UKREiiF in Leeds to shout about Bradford as a great place to invest, the city centre is truly starting to transform ahead of City of Culture 2025 and we have a new government in place, let’s hope it brings the investment we need for our rail infrastructure, the station and all the other great plans that are in place including the transformational plans for the market square in Shipley.
In this edition Bradford College who our headline sponsors for this year’s Bradford Means Business Awards are profiled as they have received a£2.6m grant and have some great development plans at the construction campus, keeping with the Business Awards we had a record number of entries and attendees at the awards which took place in late July, just short of 400 attended the glad night at Cedar Court and we will have details of all the winners in our next edition. Keeping with the awards, the event staging and AV is run by our friends at Ayre Event Solutions, who we feature in this edition too, they do a great job and partner with us on all of our big award programmes.
Finally for the first time ever in the magazine we feature “meet the bosses” instead of the “boss” as we meet the team behind Expect Distribution as they moved into new ownership, plus Bradford at Night finish us off with just one more thing.
May 2024
It’s been a busy four months in the district as we hurtle towards 2025 and our year as City of Culture. Starting with City of Culture, March saw the team unveil the new branding and showcase the different ways in which this dynamic colour scheme will be used for everything City of Culture. We loved it so much that we have given over the cover of this issue to showcase the new branding, along with a four-page feature with the team as they are busy working on the programme that will be launched in the autumn.
In partnership with the University of Bradford we produced our second report on the TOP100 businesses in the district and inside we showcase just a few of the great businesses we have, which is perfect timing as in May Bradford will be represented at UKREiiF showcasing why the district is a great place for business investment and we highlight this in this edition.
Read on for further local business successes throughout our region.
JANUARY 2024
Bradford Means Business is ringing in the changes for 2024, and we welcome you our January edition.
As we gear up to our City of Culture celebrations, Bradford 2025’s head of engagement – skills and volunteering, John McMahon, discusses a series of transformational programmes.
Launching this month are a range of youth voice, apprenticeship, and wider training roles with the ambition to create a new generation of cultural leaders in Bradford, for Bradford.
In this edition we meet Wyedean, a Haworth-based company which is “flying the flag for Yorkshire” in its highly successful specialist business.
This fourth-generation family firm is a manufacturer of military uniforms, braid, insignia, regalia and accoutrement. And as it enters its 60th anniversary year it has a lot to celebrate. High Point, on Westgate in Bradford, towers over the city skyline, with its brutalist design splitting opinion. But over the past few years, work to convert the eight-storey building into apartments has been underway, and the mammoth project is now almost complete. High Point will soon find itself in the middle of Bradford’s City Village.
And much more….
October 2023
In this edition of Bradford Means Business, we meet concrete admixture manufacturer Oscrete who are marking 40 years in business. The expanding company is finding cost effective, green solutions which don’t impact on performance, and believe that this concept is key to the future of the construction sector here in Bradford.
In matters of transport, Leeds Bradford Airport has played an integral role in the ambitious growth of the city and the wider Yorkshire region, supporting connectivity to some of the world’s best destinations for business and tourism. We look at the construction of the airport’s terminal extension, which has the potential to contribute a total of £950 million to the local economy, by 2030.
Addressing the shortage of quality family homes in the area, Artisan Real Estate share their ambitious proposals to demolish a vacant office complex on the edge of the Salts Mill World Heritage Site in Saltaire, Shipley and replace it with a vibrant and sustainable residential quarter and riverside park.
Bradford Means Business look at the organisations in Bradford district which will receive grants from the £3m Cultural Capital Fund. Funding will allow them to deliver projects which will increase the cultural infrastructure and enable more people to access and participate in cultural activities during 2025 and beyond.
We hope you enjoy the latest edition.
July 2023
In this edition of Bradford Means Business, we discover that a staggering 70 per cent of the world’s waste is electronics. But a company with bases in Bradford is doing its bit to prevent at least some of that waste going into landfill.
The small recycling company set up by husband-and-wife Rob and Nicky Seal now works from multiple sites in West Yorkshire and has more than 20 full-time employees. It offers nationwide collection services to UK businesses and organisations, such as schools, universities, and councils, and is playing its part in helping remove and recycle redundant IT equipment.
April 2023
In this edition of Bradford Means Business, we catch up with Ian Ward. The Broadway shopping centre general manager believes Bradford has a once in a lifetime chance as it approaches its City of Culture year in 2025. And he is working hard to do his bit to help ensure the city does everything it can to fully seize its golden opportunity.
Not only is Ian in charge of The Broadway, which is itself a big draw to Bradford, but he is also a member of a number of other bodies and initiatives which work together to create a bright future for the city.
The National Science and Media Museum invites us to explore their once-in-a-generation Sound and Vision Project which is entering its delivery phase, having successfully secured a £3.08m grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund.
This ambitious project will futureproof the museum for decades to come, creating two new galleries to showcase its world-class collections and an additional passenger lift, making the museum accessible to many more visitors.
We meet the inspirational Zahid Rauf, tailor and garment designer. He tells us about his involvement in DesignLab Nation, which brings together Secondary schools in partnership with the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, regional museums and creative industries to inspire students and support teachers through in-depth design projects.
We are gearing up to celebrate The Bradford Means Business Awards later on in the summer. The awards aim to celebrate success, recognise achievement and highlight innovative people and companies throughout Bradford district who are putting their region on the map. Keep an eye on bradfordmeansbusiness.com for details.
January 2023
Welcome to the first edition of Bradford Means Business for 2023.
We meet Professor Zahir Irani, who is Deputy Vice Chancellor at the University of Bradford and has a string of successes to his name.
In 2020 he was recognised by The Sunday Times as a leading influencer in Bradford and was invited by Bradford District Council to assemble a new Economic Recovery Board and produce the district’s Covid economic recovery plan. His successes in Bradford and the positive impact he is having on the city follow on from a series of impressive achievements throughout
his career.
As future technologies become part of our present, we talk to the director of VR City which was set up in September 2021 by Hasan Khan and his brother Zeeshan with the aim of recreating some of the Tokyo experience in West Yorkshire.
In the same vein, the Future Technologies Centre Expo is an opportunity for regional employers across those sectors to exhibit advances in industrial robots, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. The event is hosted by Bradford College, who has joined forces with 60 employers across six industries to build the tech workforce for the next generation.
Heading a partnership to promote development and investment in Bradford could be described as a labour of love for Pete Mills. The Chair of the new Bradford District Place Making and Investment Partnership is passionate about the city and the surrounding area. As a child he was inspired by its grand buildings and its history – and today he is no less impressed by what the city has to offer.
OCTOBER 2022
A popular figure within the community has praised the city of Bradford – encouraging fellow refugees to follow suit and move over. Dr Manoj Joshi, a successful philanthropist, businessman and pharmacist, came to the UK from Uganda, which was under the oppressive regime of Idi Amin, half a century ago. He ended up in Bradford in 1981 through work and has never looked back.
With thousands fleeing Ukraine to the UK, Dr Joshi recalls his own personal story before highlighting the good things about the city.
This year, the 70-year-old collected the Lifetime Achievement award at the Telegraph & Argus Bradford & District Education Awards.
The twin headwinds of the pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis – plus the constant issues surrounding Prime Ministers past and present, have understandably dominated this government’s attention and left little bandwidth for the complicated task of undoing decades of worsening inequality.
This edition discusses the cost-of-living crisis and uncovers some of the continuing with interventions that improve the look and feel of the city centre for businesses and their customers. Bradford is the UK’s number one levelling up opportunity and work is already under way on growing the economy and delivering key schemes in the city and district.
JULY 2022
Winning the City of Culture bid will give the whole district a huge shot in the arm so soon after the pandemic. It will be a wonderful showcase for our city and LOCALiQ, The T&A and Bradford Means Business are honoured to be playing their part. Congratulations to everyone who played a part in making #Bradford2025 a reality.
Shanaz Gulzar, chair of Bradford 2025, said that: “This is a huge opportunity to celebrate our extraordinary cultural heritage and for our young, diverse population – who have been so involved in shaping our bid – to become leaders and change-makers and begin a new chapter in our story.
Bradford has been overlooked and underestimated for so long – it’s now our time to shine.”
Winning the title will bring an estimated extra£700 million, into the district, creating 3,000 jobs and attracting around 1.1 million visitors. It will inevitably be a game-changer for the district; with long term benefits including increased employment, new investment, enhanced skills, renewed pride, greater cultural capacity and more opportunities to participate in arts and cultural activities.
Now the entire country will have the chance to see what a fantastic city it is.
APRIL 2022
Welcome to the latest edition of Bradford Means Business magazine. Bradford has been announced as one of four shortlisted places up for the UK City of Culture, approved by Secretary of State for the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Nadine Dorries, and selected from eight longlisted locations across the UK.
Winning the City of Culture bid would give the whole district a huge shot in the arm so soon after the pandemic. It will be a wonderful showcase for our city and the T&A is honoured to be playing its part.
New research has highlighted the towns and cities in England which could make the best use of the government’s levelling up funds.
We talk to one of Keighley’s best-known family companies who are celebrating its 40th anniversary this year – they say that putting people first has been the key to its success.
JANUARY 2022
Welcome to the latest edition of Bradford Means Business magazine.
We look at schemes to revitalise Bradford city and Keighley town centres which have taken a step closer and could play a huge part in revitalising these urban centres over the next few years. Both schemes have been widely welcomed locally and are seen as a vital part of the post-pandemic recovery. In addition, Bradford’s transformative new markets scheme has been designed to spearhead the city’s green recovery by creating a modern new ecological retail space for the city’s market traders.
OCTOBER 2021
Welcome to the latest issue of Bradford Means Business. The Covid pandemic continues to be a thorn in the side for business and this month’s magazine shines a light on some of the businesses that are leading the district’s recovery.
July 2021
Welcome to the latest edition of Bradford Means Business – an edition where we can hopefully start to look forward to a new post-pandemic beginning for our district.
April 2021
Welcome to the latest edition of Bradford Means Business magazine – as Bradford carefully re-opens after the most recent National Lockdown.
January 2021
Welcome to the latest edition of Bradford Means Business magazine – the first edition of 2021 and hopefully, the start of a better year for business. Businesses, from small cafes to huge airlines, from car manufacturers to hairdressers, have all been hugely affected by the impact of Covid-19, and we investigate what that might mean for local entrepreneurs.
November 2020
We live in a technological age. It isn’t hyperbole to say that the world is going through seismic changes, the likes of which we haven’t seen since the Industrial Revolution. Technology is changing everything, from the way we do our shopping to how we consume media and drive our cars. A vibrant technology sector will underpin Bradford’s growth for the rest of the century. Following the success of Bradford Tech Week, this issue of Bradford Means Business delves deep into how technology really is changing in Bradford and how Tech Week has provided tech opportunities to young people and inspired a generation.
August 2020
Welcome to the latest edition of Bradford Means Business. With the UK and most of the world shut down as people sheltered from a deadly virus the shock to the economic system will be severe and challenging.
However there are still reasons to be optimistic. In this edition we focus on the businesses who embraced a new way of working and overcame adversity. Times may be tough, but Bradford is still thriving.
April 2020
The UK is bracing itself for the full impact of COVID-19, whose effect on business has been profound. As a result of the Government-mandated lockdown, many businesses find themselves in uncharted territory. How do you continue to trade when no one is buying? What do you do with your loyal workforce and how do you shield your business from the worst so it is ready to resume when the pandemic has passed? Bradford Means Business investigates.
January 2020
Welcome to the first edition of the new year and the beginning of a new decade. We are showcasing some of the upcoming ‘big ticket’ items that give us optimism for the future.
Richard Shaw tells us why the Bradford City of Culture bid is so important to our future prosperity. The bid, which is awarded once every four years by the Government, is backed by the council but will be spearheaded by a new Cultural Partnership made up of representatives from all sectors.
Also in this edition, we feature Manufacturing Week – a spotlight for some of the district’s most dynamic businesses – and welcome a new columnist, Juliette Healey of the Bank of England.
October 2019
In this issue, we chat to Expect Distribution’s, Neil Rushworth, about his journey to logistics excellence, Bradford’s ambitious bid to become the UK’s city of culture in 2025, the development of the new Bradford Food Market in early 2020 and how family business JCT600 has become one of the best-known names in Yorkshire.
