IMAGE CREDIT: Hayley and Ashley Dawson
A couple in Pevensey Bay, running the successful AD Signs company have begun a campaign to ‘bring their business home’—Bay Life, 26 July 2017
Questions over support for business infrastructure in Pevensey Bay as local couple take their case to MP, Huw Merriman
The company,. well known and liked in Pevensey Bay where they live, and responsible for some of the best signage in the Bay for shopfronts and venues have begun a campaign to highlight the lack of resources and input into the business infrastructure of the Bay.
Their work includes profiles for the 1066 Store and Bay Barbers. They have expressed their frustration about the lack of a shopfront being available to them in Pevensey Bay and want to ‘bring their business home’
Ashley, on behalf of the couple put it to Bay LIfe, “somewhat ironic that we have a successful signage company and we can not find in Pevensey Bay a suitable small shop front we desperately need, because there appears to be no interest with regard to the local authorities seeing that the infrastructure of the business community here is supported,”
“Millions being spent down the road on business, this side of Sovereign Harbour, 10 new beach huts for Pevensey Bay, which will be fabulous for the profile of the Bay, and big developments are under consideration here. Not a word about supporting the business infrastructure here that is so obviously and desperately needed, you could not make it up really could you?
“Not a single penny being spent to support the business infrastructure here, so we have ended up commuting to Bexhill, so what exactly is all that about then?”
Hayley, his wife and business partner, who deals with customer communications for the company told Bay Life last week, “took over one hour to get to work this morning in Bexhill, it will be bad now for the six weeks whilst children are on school holidays. We need our shopfront in Pevensey desperately”.
The couple who began their business four and half years ago, have searched in vain for a shop front here in Pevensey Bay and say that simply no-one wants to know or is prepared take up their case.
They commute to Bexhill, with the attendant problems. They have a business space and frontage on the first floor of a building in Bexhill, which provides them with limited access for their customers and little profile from the footfall in the road where they promote their business.
The couple say that they have found that the absence of any shop space in Pevensey Bay and the lack of interest in the question has now reached a point which will see them involve their MP, Huw Merriman, in the question.
Ashley comments, “ee have been told that Huw Merriman is a good bloke and hard working for local people and we know that he holds surgery meetings in his constituency here in Pavensey Bay at the Bay Side Diner
“We have been told that he takes a keen interest in rural questions, particularly rural questions linked to local economic questions and we have also been told that his interest is in finding sustainable solutions to these problems.
“Well here we have a key local economic question about the fabric of High Streets, which everyone is talking about, except in our case, this is not a general question on a committee agenda, it is about the future of our business and our livelihoods.
“We are not asking to be sustained, we are asking to be seen.
The frustration of seeing the millions being spent down the road in the business park at Sovereign Harbour, without a penny being spent here has added to their frustration about the future of their business.
With much of their work here, the couple argue that they could make a bigger success of their business here and that a shopfront would be transformative .
They also argue that a return of their business home to Pevensey Bay would also add a dimension to the business community there in Pevensey Bay.
Ashly told Bay Life “I set up the business about five years ago, I had a nervous breakdown, and the business was set up as I was coming out of it, it gave me something to focus on.
“I set up at home doing stickers, done for friends, I was doing everything from signage for clothes to business cards. Bexhill was the only place where we could find shop front space, we need the space.
The company has gone on to provide branded clothing, vehicle signage, as well as signage for a number of well known enterprises here.
Ashley explains that their dilemma is a very simple one, “we are here, we have got lots of clients here and we just want to be where the community is and where we live”.
He lists clients like the Aqua Bar, 1066 Store to Bay Barbers. Hearing their story calls into question views expressed about the lack of potential for business in Pevensey Bay. The story also brings into sharp relief the apparent lack of direct input in business regeneration from the local authority.
This week we see a new chinese take away open. We understand that a flower shop is being mooted and is at a stage where more information about the enterprise may become public soon. The siting of the shop, we believe, involves the return of a residential property to business usage.
Without question there is a new lease of life in relation to both the perception of business activity here and a revitalising interest in Pevensey Bay as both a business and residential location.
With economic and development growth beginning to appear in and around Pevensey Bay, happening in front of our eyes, the enterprising couple have hit on a question that is fundamental to their business but the question may also be fundamental to the future of the fragile business community here.
Support, interest and application to the question by the local authority seems to be a requirement here.
Given the fact that what appears to be required is the same tipping point success marker that is planned with the coming with the fabulous 10 new beach huts, perhaps the same forward thinking and vision could be applied to the question of the small economic infrastructure here.
The key word for any such development with enterprise is sustainability.
AD Signs does not just tick all the boxes with their success story, they can illuminate those boxes in big bright and subtle pastel beachside colours, because that is what they do for a living.
Does it not beggar belief that such a company and a clear homegrown success story, can not find a home here?
The story of the small company may well be one of a growing number here in these new days in which we now live.
The ‘Bring AD Signs Home’ campaign is something that will now to be put to Wealden Council, for the local authority to comment.
Before they approach Wealden Council for response to their question, the couple are aiming to win the public support of local MP Huw Merriman in their search for a shopfront business home here.
As Ashley puts it, “where we are we in Bexhill, we are not visible, we have loads of people phone us and say they can not find us.
“Here in Pevensey Bay, they would find us by walking down the Eastbourne Road and into the parade, we might even have done the signage next door, and yes we would make Pevensey Bay proud with our own signage for our new home here”.
Bay Life will follow the story of the ‘Bring AD Signs Home” campaign with interest.
