We are Mandy Weston and Gareth I Jones.
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In 2012, we co-founded Welsh ICE. We wanted to fill a gap in the existing offers of business support by creating an approachable and nurturing community where entrepreneurs could pop in for a coffee and find everything they needed to know about running a business – whether they have an idea, or whether have been going for 50 years.
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You wouldn’t believe how many people told us that it couldn’t be done – how many people said that we’d never find enough entrepreneurs in Caerphilly. But guess what? It is now the largest community of coworking start-up and micro-businesses in the UK (outside of London). In just 5 years at ICE, we created 620 jobs and supported over 350 businesses, and put £53 million back into the Welsh economy.
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In 2017, we left ICE (though it is still going strong – check it out here) and founded Town Square Spaces. We are working on bringing the creative, collaborative community that is so popular in South Wales, to entrepreneurs around the rest of the UK.
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We are hugely passionate about what we do, and our main focus is always the individual, whether our staff, or the entrepreneurs we support.