As the weather warms up so do the events it seems, with places to be and people to see.
We were delighted to meet the lovely Peter Hibble, who works for PDSA Orpington – and who was nominated by his manager Aaron for July’s ‘Local Hero’ – have a read in the July issue.
We also paid a visit to Oxfam Orpington who held a Volunteer Recruitment Day. Charities rely heavily on the goodwill of people giving up their time to volunteer – this could be anything from organising donations and rearranging the shelves, to working on the till and helping people with enquiries. If you’re got a few hours free a week to help, why not call up a local charity to ask if they need volunteers? Sharing is caring!
Right at the beginning of this month the Picturehouse in Bromley opened up and we were invited to the opening preview night (the main picture shows us in the foyer).
The new cinema has done a cracking job in terms of its interiors – really impressive was finding out that it had managed to retain the original Art Deco flooring was wonderful to hear. And did you know that there is a restaurant inside too – you can make a night of a visit there.
A mini expansion
As part of our magazine expansion, we’re now offering local reviews for businesses and services. If you think you’ve got something great and want us to try it out, email us at hello@lifeinmagazines.co.uk
This month we reviewed the lunchtime tapas menu at Thara Thai in Locksbottom (also based in Hayes) – you’ll be able to read our honest opinion in the July issue.
We’ve also expanded to start offering local businesses social media management. With Twitter, Facebook and Instagram playing such a large part in today’s society, it’s sometimes hard to keep all the plates spinning when you’re trying to run a business.
Whether it’s just coming up with content and images and supplying these to you to promote, or taking full management over the social media side of things (including engagement), we’ve got it covered. If you’re interested in finding out more, call us on 07403-603569 or email hello@lifeinmagazines.co.uk
Networking
This month we were invited to a ‘Movers & Shakers’ meeting at Biggin Hill Airport – a new initiative to look at how local businesses can forge better relationships with each other, via networking and with the council.
It was a great meeting with plenty covered and loads of new ideas generated. Many networking event facilitators were in attendance to help spread the word about what was discussed, and we’ll also be covering this in the magazine so that High Street businesses, local companies and sole traders can gen up on what help is available to them.
For the first time we also attended PIB (People In Business) networking in Orpington. It was a really well organised event and seemed like everyone was very welcoming. It’s great when people just ‘get’ the idea of true business networking – if you’re just attending to ‘sell, sell, sell’, you’re going about it the completely wrong way. It’s about forging new relationships and supporting one another in business.
If you are planning on attending networking events, please be aware that this is the protocol for most of them – after all, no one likes pushy sales people. Be genuine, be yourself and be prepared to help and support others.
There are plenty of networking events happening locally if you’re interested in finding out more. In fact, Bromley Council now has a new networking events section on its website – see www.bromley.gov.uk/business We’ll also be covering local networking events available in the August issue (on the business page), so keep an eye out for this.
We also attended the Enchanted Festival in Priory Gardens at the beginning of this month and a prostate charity event at Chelsfield Golf Centre. As fans of interiors, we were also thrilled to receive an invite to the Exclusively Homewares Show and the Lidl Christmas Showcase which we both enjoyed thoroughly.
The kids are away…
On a more personal note, Nicky celebrated her birthday this month and both our girls were whisked away on a ‘PGL’ trip this month – they visited the Isle of Wight to take part in some amazing activities including canoeing, rock climbing, adventure trails and assault courses.
It was strange not having them around (and yes, we missed them very much!), but it’s a new chapter in their childhood and they’ll soon be off to secondary school. It’s scary on how quickly they grow up…we still can’t get used to it!
We were delighted to see that we featured on the cover for the Crofton Residents’ Association June edition of its newsletter.
They had some glowing words about Life In…Orpington…
“Of all the free publications that we receive, we are most impressed by the very new “Life In Orpington” magazine. If you normally throw such papers aside to read later (and then never do) please have a look at this new one, which was launched in March. It is not just all adverts…there is a very good mix of useful articles, tips, things to do, places to go. They are addressing their readers as human beings with families and feelings.”
We felt chuffed to bits to see this – and comments like this make all our hard work seem worth it.
Coming up next month…
We’ll be attending some more Christmas showcase events which we’re excited about – it will feel odd ‘celebrating’ Christmas in July, but the bigger companies work months in advance on what’s trending for the seasons, but it will be interesting to see what’s new this year!
No doubt we’ll also be attending some more networking events and keeping our ear to the ground on what’s happening locally.
Meanwhile, a quick shout out regarding our local heroes page…if you know someone who deserves a bit of recognition in our local community, please let us know. It could be a neighbour who has been helping someone, a parent at the local school who gives up their time to volunteer, a charity worker or even a child who has done themselves proud. You can email us at hello@lifeinmagazines.co.uk