Creating Social Capital and What It’s Worth: The Alton Business Hub

When we heard about Signal, a new business hub in Bordon, that offered free shared work space and links between businesses, we were keen to get involved. We have expertise and knowledge to share and also want to learn from other businesses. We also asked ourselves, why isn’t there an Alton Business Hub?

We totally understand the idea of creating social capital by sharing spaces and, more importantly, ideas. Not your traditional law firm, we have already opened up our beautiful gardens for free to our community and have had yoga classes and charity events sharing our wonderful resource.

We are now in the process of opening up our boardroom space to anyone who wants to sit at a desk and use the wifi. By giving something back, that costs us nothing and would otherwise be underused, we hope to improve our links within the small town community we serve. What we gain is immeasurable – human connection in a world that seems to want to divide us.

Creating an Alton Business Hub  

If you can make it to Signal you really should go and visit – it is an inspiring place run by inspiring people. There are several in the Hampshire area so check out where your nearest one is.

To set up and run a discrete building like Signal costs money and that is something Alton Town Council say they haven’t got.  Not put off by their lack of enthusiasm for the idea we want to see if we can create a Business Hub that is spread over many offices and businesses in the town and costs nothing.  We want to create a Business Hub for businesses that is run by businesses – because we know that all business is good for the town!

We will offer some of our free space to other businesses and entrepreneurs in Alton to use like a hub. We are not charging for the space as we believe the idea of social capital is more valuable. Meeting other people who run businesses in different areas will be refreshing. We also want to offer free talks and share our journey. Creating a firm with the ethos of ‘everyone matters’ and one that is so efficient we insist nobody works late or weekends, is something we are proud of and that any business can do.

We think we can create a Hub by sharing what space we have free on a newly made Facebook page – this will be set up when we know we have interest.

We need you!

To make a business hub like this work we will need other businesses, who also might have expertise or space to share, to join us.  We want to create a hub in Alton that is free to use and encourages entrepreneurs, small businesses, lone traders, those without shop fronts and others who feel they need support, to thrive within Alton.  We want to play a positive role in making the town a business positive place.

What you can do:

Contact Practice Manager, Paula Langley, on paula@bookersandbolton.co.uk or 01420 82881 if:

• You are interested in this idea in any way – as a user or a sharer
• You have free space you think you can offer and wonder how it might be used
• You want to use our free space
• You want to get some free training and meet other local businesses
• You can offer free training to other local businesses
• You want a new way of networking and sharing your business to other businesses
• You want to help start and be part of the Alton Business Hub revolution!