Budding businesses get supportive boost

BENDIGO entrepreneurs prepared to take their professional ideas to the next level at the Emporium Creative Hub’s Creative Business Incubator presentation evening last week.

Speaking to a room packed full of local arts industry leaders and supportive peers, presenters pitched everything from film marketing to illustrations businesses.

Fashion forward Sally Poltrock joined the 14-week Incubator to kick start her business helping people make the most out of their wardrobes.

“I’m so passionate about fashion but I’m also passionate about the environment and sustainability. We’re producing so much and we’re buying too much” she said.

“I really appreciate quality over quantity, and I want to help people with their investment pieces that will last them for a lifetime.

“I also want to help them with pieces in their wardrobe that I can re-fashion and make a new look for them to help them with their confidence, identity and individuality.”

For Natalie Ryan, the COVID-19 pandemic forced her to find ways to adapt her established business, Meander Designs, in uncertain times.

The textile designer joined the Incubator to develop a new online print-to-order fabric service for her customers.

“Design markets were a really important part of my business and that area of income disappeared pretty much overnight [during COVID],” she said.

“I needed to take my business in a new direction that didn’t rely on markets.

“I always get a lot of requests online, through email and in person for printed meterage of my own designs so that people can sew clothes or make things for their home using my fabrics.”

“I’d really like to build it up so I have quite a nice selection of fabrics that people can use, and it could move into wallpaper. Down the track it would be great to get a textile printer in Bendigo.”

Emporium Creative Hub manager David Hughes said he was impressed by the breadth of ideas brought to the table by Bendigo creatives.

“That just reflects what the creative industries are like,” he said.

“The Incubator is about taking those sparks of ideas, building on them and giving people a framework to structure them to get them to the next stage.”

Mr Hughes said Bendigo’s creative ecosystem was starting to develop with more funding for the Emporium Creative Hub to secure its future until 2024 and through formal plans like the City’s Greater Creative Bendigo Strategy.

“We’ve got this really great opportunity to nurture what’s happening at a grassroots level,” he said.