Business Q&A: Dan Simpson, Harrogate Organics

This is the latest in a regular series of Business Q&A features published weekly.  

This week, we spoke to Dan Simpson, co-owner of Harrogate Organics in Harrogate.

Tell us in fewer than 30 words what your firm does. 

We sell products that can help solve problems such as sleep, anxiety and stress. Sleep is the number-one wellness product on the planet. If you’re getting sleep, you’re regenerating; if not, you’re degenerating.

What does it require to be successful in business? 

Nerve. It’s cliché, but if it were easy, everybody would be doing it. Everything in business is a test, a lesson, and you just have to hold your nerve and keep persevering.

What drives you to do what you do every day? 

It’s a cheesy answer, but customer feedback. This is the best job in the world, because we get such profound feedback. It’s not unusual for a customer to tell us “You’ve changed my life”.

What has been the toughest issue your company has had to deal with over the last 12 months? 

Finance: the acquisition of capital. Logistics are tough, but the headwinds of opening in a UK business market are really difficult. Banks make it nearly impossible to borrow money to invest in the business.

Business rates are archaic too – it’s just unreasonable the way high-street companies are charged they way they are, compared with online companies.

Which other local firms do you most admire and why? 

I like Harrogate Spring Water and what they’ve achieved. I like the brand and what they’ve done with it.

I admire NEOM too – they have a nice, clean brand.

Who are the most inspiring local leaders? 

I don’t have any. I was a Harrogate boy from the age of nine to 17, but moved to London for four years and then spent the next 20 years away in Dubai. Since I’ve got back, I don’t feel like my feet have touched the ground, so I’m going to abstain from that one!

Photo of Dan Simpson, co-founder of Harrogate Organics.

Dan Simpson

What could be done locally to boost business? 

More could done to market Harrogate externally. We have Harrogate BID and it does things like the Christmas Market very well, but I think more could be done in terms of encouraging more pop-up shops in unused locations. There are loads of small businesses out there that would be fantastic doing that.

Parking too. Not much is done to encourage people to come into town. I know we need to encourage a green ethos – taking the bus and cycling – but the reality is that Harrogatonians are relatively lazy. I don’t mean that critically, but it’s quite a wealthy town, most people have multiple cars, and it’s easier just to drive into town than it is to hop on a bus.

People just don’t want to pay for parking. If they have to, they’ll just shop online. But online is great if you want to buy a spanner, but you need to be able to browse around towns.

The other thing is: business rates have got to go. I wouldn’t usually vote Labour, but it’s in their manifesto, so I would this time.

Best and worst things about running a business from Harrogate? 

The best: the Harrogate name has a respectability about it, which is why we used it in our name. There’s a kudos attached to it.

The downside: it’s a minor niggle, but connectivity. We only just connected to fibre last week, so it shouldn’t be an issue anymore, but it has been a big problem. We’ve had to shut the shop about 10 times over the last two years because the copper wires just couldn’t cope, so we couldn’t run our phones, computers, tills or music.

What are your business plans for the future? 

The next step for us is more of a centralised distribution and logistical solution, because we’re growing at such an incredible rate. We’ll keep the shop because a) we like it, and b) people like to know they’re buying from an actual physical entity, but realistically, we’re going to need a a warehouse so we can get larger volumes of product out.

Once we’ve got to that point, then we’ll start looking at certifications like B Corp.

What do you like to do on your time off? 

Time off? Good one! I work, and at weekends it’s chores – doing things and fixing things. I like golf when I play it, but I played twice last year!

Best place to eat and drink locally? 

There are lots of good places in Harrogate. I like Spice Culture, the Little Ale House and Starling – anywhere independent and a bit different.

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‘I’ll probably lock the door and cry’, says owner of closing Harrogate shop

When Jo Brain opened a sandwich shop on Skipton Road in Harrogate in 1972, she probably little suspected that it would still be serving up bacon butties more than half a century later. 

The Bread Bin became the go-to place for a quick breakfast, brunch or lunch in the New Park area long before “go-to place” was a commonly used phrase. 

After passing through several owners’ hands in the 1980s, it was bought by Jenny Stanley, who in 1991 took on Lesley Smith as an employee. Lesley bought it in 1997, and it is her daughter, Jude Gray, who runs it today. 

But, as reported by the Stray Ferret last week, the Bread Bin’s regular customers will have to find a new place to grab a sandwich, because the local landmark shop is to close within weeks. 

Jude took the decision to shut a couple of months ago. She told the Stray Ferret: 

“Since covid we’ve watched the stock prices go up, and the utilities have all got more expensive. Brexit hasn’t helped. It’s put a lot of importers off bringing produce in, so for example salad is more expensive, and the new import checks coming in will only make it worse. 

“We’ve downsized from six people to three since covid hit, but at New Year we thought it just wasn’t going to get any better.” 

For many who live and work in New Park, it will be the end of an era, and for some, almost the passing of a daily part of life. Jude said: 

“We’ve had some very long-standing customers. It’s quite unusual for a shop like this – usually they rely on passing trade. 

“One man first came in in 1979 when he was a soldier based at Penny Pot. He’s now a pensioner but he still comes in – 45 years later. 

“We don’t tend to know people by name, but we do know their orders. With some of them, as soon as they come through the door we start cooking for them, because we know exactly what they want.” 

The menu offers the old standards – any of the main components of a cooked breakfast, in bread – as well as more recent innovations, such as Chinese chicken mayonnaise and piri piri chicken. And chips, of course. Jude said: 

“It’s a bit of a time-warp, really. Some of the newer places tend to have healthier menus, and I did give that a try, but the customers weren’t interested. They gave it a poke but preferred to stick with their old favourites.” 

With such a loyal customer base, it must be a going concern, so why didn’t she just put it on the market? After all, cafés and eateries are always springing up around town – there must be someone willing to give it a go? But that, it seems, is exactly the problem – there are at least six sandwich shops currently on the market in Harrogate. Jude said: 

“There are so many other cafés up for sale at the moment, and they’re just not shifting. We would have been waiting a hell of a long time to sell it.” 

Instead, Jude plans to convert it into a house, and swap homes with her mum. She said: 

“Mum lives in a lovely little flat upstairs, and we’ll move into that, and my husband’s very into cycling, so downstairs will become somewhere he can keep his bikes. Mum will move into the house we’ve been living in, which is all on one level.” 

The house-swap is about as far into the future as Jude is looking – she doesn’t yet have any firm plans for the future. She doesn’t think she’ll regret saying goodbye to the Bread Bin, and yet shutting up shop for the last time at the end of February – or possibly in March – won’t be easy. She said: 

“I’ll probably just lock the door for the last time and cry. I’ve made more money in other jobs, but this has definitely been my favourite.  

“But it’s for the best. I’m pleased we’ve made this decision.” 

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Why is Harrogate so lacking in fun for young people?

For parents of older children and teenagers it’s a familiar refrain: “There’s nothing to do”. But in the Harrogate district, the kids have got a point: there is very little for them do that’s indoors, legal and affordable. 

There are sporting facilities of course, but most young people’s friendship groups are not based on a single interest such as gymnastics or cricket, and besides, the balance between physical activity and social interaction at sports clubs often tends to be tipped towards sweat rather than fun. For pure, escapist enjoyment, there’s not a lot out there. 

It’s a problem Sally Haslewood is all too familiar with. As founder of family matters website Harrogate Mumbler, she knows very well what options there are for teenagers in the district. She told the Stray Ferret: 

“Harrogate is quite well-served for things for under-12s, but once they get a bit older, there’s very little. There’s really not a lot for them to do other than hang around. 

“The poor kids have got nowhere to go. I grew up in Harrogate, and it’s been a problem here for a long time. 

“When Oxygen [trampoline park] opened in York last week, the reaction on Mumbler was really enthusiastic – it created quite a buzz – but people were also asking ‘why can’t we have something like that here?’. 

Why indeed. Why is there such a dearth of indoor activities for people of pre-drinking age in Harrogate, and – perhaps more to the point – is there any chance of the situation changing? 

Trampolining

A few years ago, it very nearly did. In December 2017, a company called Go Jumpin Ltd was granted planning permission to build an indoor trampoline centre at Hornbeam Park. 

Families around the district cheered, and waited. But in vain. Go Jumpin went bust and was bought out by a firm that decided not to go ahead with the plans. The centre was never built. 

You might think that since then, some other company would have taken up the cause. After all, Harrogate has a far higher average income than most other towns in the region, as well as nearly 7,000 secondary school-aged children. The council was surely onside – it had granted planning permission – and the demand is certainly there. 

In the case of trampoline parks, one big issue is height. Hornbeam Park Developments’ Chris Bentley, who remembers the Go Jumpin episode well, said: 

“The problem is that you need 10-12 metres in height and most large buildings are only six metres at the eaves, so it’s very difficult to find a building with that height.” 

That’s not a problem, though, for pretty much any other indoor leisure pursuit – they tend to be more ground-based – and yet we don’t have many of those either. 

We did have an ice rink over Christmas, and many people – including Sally Haslewood – appreciated the extra dimension it brought to the town’s leisure options. So the Stray Ferret contacted several ice-rink operators and a governing body several times to ask how likely a more permanent, indoor facility in the town might be, but received no reply from any of them. Take that as you will, but it could be interpreted as an indicator of their level of interest in the town.

The outdoor ice-rink at Christmas in Harrogate.

The temporary outdoor Christmas ice-rink in Harrogate. Photo: Smart Avenue Media.

Bowling alleys

Bowling alleys, on the other hand, could be a more likely prospect, and are arguably exactly the kind of facility that Harrogate is crying out for. After all, most operators nowadays don’t just offer bowling, but have other activities on site as well, such as air hockey, crazy pool, ping-pong, batting cages, indoor golf and even karaoke. 

Young people in our neighbouring cities are spoilt for choice: Leeds has two bowling-led leisure facilities, and York has two within a 10-minute drive of each other. Even Skipton has one. 

In contrast, Harrogate did once have a bowling alley on Tower Street that offered a few lanes of kegelbahn – a German nine-pin variant – but there have been no signs of a replacement since it closed a generation ago. 

Gary Brimble, general secretary of industry body UK Tenpin Bowling Operators, suspects it may be a matter of size. He told us: 

“Harrogate’s proximity to Leeds and York is probably the reason why nobody has wanted to open a bowling centre there. 

“The vast majority of the centres run by the two biggest providers, Hollywood and Tenpin, have 24 lanes or more, like the ones those companies have in Leeds. They look for huge spaces of 25-60,000 sq ft, and it takes a lot of catchment to fill that. The same goes for multiplex cinemas, which Harrogate also doesn’t have. 

“But Harrogate might appeal more to smaller providers. Lane 7, Roxy Leisure and Gravity are all expanding rapidly and looking for new sites. They tend to go in with eight, 10 or 12 lanes, coupled with a very good food and drink offer.” 

Lane 7 has 13 venues nationally, and four “coming soon”, including one in York. Owner Tim Wilks told the Stray Ferret: 

“We’ve looked at Harrogate before and it is somewhere we would consider putting a small bowling alley, however, finding the right property with the right rent makes it difficult – it’s an affluent area and with that comes higher rents.”

High rents and no students

This is a factor mentioned by many in the leisure industry: Harrogate just a little on the expensive side. One leisure property specialist told us: 

“The rents in central Harrogate are about the same as they are in Leeds city centre, mainly because it’s a nice place to be, but you’ll probably make half the turnover in Harrogate that you would in Leeds. So it all comes down to: where would a leisure company rather go?” 

The same source pinpointed another factor which weighs heavily with modern leisure companies. They said: 

“One of the problems with Harrogate is that there isn’t much of an after-work corporate crowd or a student population past drinking age. The majority of people over 18 leave, at least for a few years while they’re at university, and that raises issues with staffing: who’s going to work there?” 

A possible solution

Nevertheless, the very fact that at least one trampoline company and one bowling operator have considered opening facilities in Harrogate suggests that the town is not beyond hope, and perhaps the model pioneered by Gravity could offer a solution.

The Wakefield-based company has recently taken over former Debenhams premises in Liverpool and Wandsworth, transforming the town-centre department stores into hi-tech leisure hubs, with e-karting, urban street golf, virtual-reality shoot-outs and alternative-reality ten-pin bowling. 

Harrogate, of course, has a vacant Debenhams – with a multi-storey car-park next door. And, says Gary Brimble, bowling alleys tend to be regarded as a “planning gain”. He said: 

“You don’t get the problems and the concerns from the neighbours that you get with some other types of business, such as casinos or nightclubs, with the noise and people tipping out into the street all at the same time. We tend to be very good neighbours.” 

Sadly, though, that ship may have sailed – the new owners of the Debenhams site have applied for planning permission to convert the building into retail units and flats above. But the principle is still valid, according to Hornbeam Park’s Chris Bentley. He said: 

“If you could find buildings that could accommodate four or five different leisure facilities, plus catering and toilets, that could be good. You’d be hard pressed to find a newbuild in Harrogate to accommodate all that, but if Boots or M&S ever moved out of their current premises in Harrogate, they’d be perfect – you could have multiple operators there: bowling, paintballing, laser, go-karting.

“The same management could look after the whole thing and it would have the same toilets and catering, and you’d get economies of scale, which is what you need in Harrogate.” 

M&S upping sticks might seem like a distant prospect (even if it looks likely in Bradford), but the economic headwinds that are currently giving most sectors such a rough passage appear to be filling the sails of the leisure companies. While many other industries are hunkering down and hoping for better days, bowling operators are enjoying something of a boom. Data from Lloyds Bank shows a massive increase in spending at alleys in December, up by 106% on the previous year – more than any other activity in the ‘non-essential spending’ category. 

Gary Brimble said: 

“Bowling operators have had continued growth throughout the recession, and there is an awful lot of activity in the leisure sector. There are more locations now, and more spending going on at existing locations. They don’t seem to be as affected as some other companies by people tightening their pursestrings.” 

So while the demand is there, and the operators are flush with cash, perhaps one of the smaller operators will meet the demand that has been pent up in Harrogate for decades. In spite of the high rents and the absence of a student population, Harrogate might yet attract an entrepreneurial leisure operator that could give young people a reason to go out on a wet weekend, and “something to do”.

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Business Q&A: Paul Rawlinson, Baltzersen’s & Bakeri Baltzersen

This is the second in a new weekly series of Business Q&A features. 

This week, we spoke to Paul Rawlinson, director of Baltzersen’s and Bakeri Baltzersen on Oxford Street, Harrogate. 

Tell us in fewer than 30 words what your firm does. 

We have two parts. Baltzersen’s is a Scandinavian-inspired café in the centre of Harrogate serving breakfast, brunch, lunch, coffee and pastries. Bakeri Baltzersen is a wholesale and retail bakery that supplies businesses across North and West Yorkshire and has shops in Harrogate and Wetherby.

What does it require to be successful in business?

We’ve been in business for 12 years and the last four years have been particularly eventful. What it requires is the willingness to consistently turn up and keep moving forward and trying to improve. Ultimately, we want to make things better for our guests and customers, our teams and our family.

What drives you to do what you do every day? 

I look at how far we’ve come as a business and I know we’re not close to where I want to be. Not for the people that work within the business and not on a personal level.  There is so much more to do.

What has been the toughest issue your company has had to deal with over the last 12 months? 

I think it’s the constant change that’s tough to deal with, and that stretches back beyond 12 months – it’s been non-stop drama for four years. With a business that’s open seven days a week and often with someone on duty up to 23 hours a day, there’s always the potential for something to go awry!  

I do think in the last four or five months we’ve seen a lot of businesses, big and small, finally losing the fight, and I always feel for people who’ve given everything they could and not been able to come out the other side.

Which other local firms do you most admire and why? 

In Harrogate everyone knows Bettys – it’s iconic. The longevity of the company, the way they have grown the Taylors side of that business, and the way they walk the talk on sourcing and investing in the supplier side of that business is to be admired.

Who are the most inspiring local leaders? 

I look to colleagues who run businesses locally with a lot of admiration. What people are able to do with relatively modest resources and the venues and experiences they can create is unreal. People like Simon at Starling or Rich and Danni at Little Ale House – they’re working in their businesses and investing back into them to make them better.

What could be done locally to boost business? 

I think it’s a really tricky time and there are lots of different strategies for different businesses – and it’s tough to please everyone. There’s no doubt for Harrogate the conference centre is a point of difference and brings a lot of business to town, so making the best use of that facility is absolutely key.

I’d like to see some action at national level around business rates, and from a hospitality perspective a decrease in VAT could really help.

Best and worst things about running a business from Harrogate? 

I haven’t grown up in Harrogate and I feel privileged to live here, even if sometimes you see and hear people complaining. We’ve always had great support locally and I value that. I think people are willing to pay that little bit more for something they believe is worth it. It does feel like town is very quiet during the week. Sometimes I look at York and Leeds and think I would like a bit of that volume!

What are your business plans for the future? 

We’re in the process of making some big changes to our range of products at the bakery. We’re launching a vegan range, we’ll have some more frequently rotating products, and once that’s sorted we’ll be focusing back in on bread. We’d like to open more retail bakery shops/cafés in the future, but it all takes time! 

What do you like to do on your time off? 

We have two boys under 10, so we spend a lot of time taking them to various sports and activities and generally amusing them. We watched Northern Superchargers [cricket team in Leeds] in The Hundred over the summer, have seen a couple of Leeds Knights ice hockey games at Elland Road this season and a few Harrogate Town games – all great family activities. Spending time with family is the most important thing, and this hasn’t always been easy with a growing business, so I’m conscious I don’t want to lose any more time.

I play padel with friends at Surge in Hornbeam Park, which has been really fun over the last few years.  

Best place to eat and drink locally? 

If we eat out in Harrogate we’ll likely go to Stuzzi or Domo [the Japanese restaurant in the Montpellier Quarter].  

I think we’re blessed with an amazing indie bar scene, so it’s great to be able to visit Little Ale House, North Bar, Starling, Major Tom’s Social, Husk, The Disappearing Chin, Roosters or Cold Bath Brewing Co. I love it when friends visit and I can take them around all of these venues without a brewery tie in sight. A lot of places can’t compete.

I’d recommend everyone to visit Josh and Ellie at their new home for Paradise just near the Jubilee Car Park – it’s another great addition.

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Locked public toilets causing great inconvenience in the afternoon

When you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go, but in parts of the Harrogate district it seems you can’t, unless you go early. 

That’s because an apparent change in the cleaning regime has resulted in some toilets now being closed as early as three o’clock in the afternoon, causing problems for people caught short later in the day. 

The Stray Ferret’s attention was drawn to the issue by a reader, who on condition of anonymity told us: 

“I went to the toilets outside Crescent Gardens [in Harrogate] halfway through the afternoon and they were being locked up for the night. I was astonished. I was told the toilets around the district are now being closed from 2pm onwards.” 

Sources at the council who also wished to remain anonymous confirmed the reader’s story. They told the Stray Ferret that a new cleaning regime had been put in place in October. 

Where the district’s toilets are 

According to North Yorkshire Council’s website, there are eight public toilets in Harrogate, five in Knaresborough, five in Nidderdale, four in Ripon, and one each in Masham and Ripley. All of them are listed as being open from 8am to 6pm from November to March, or till 8pm between April and October. The only exceptions are the toilets at Glasshouses, Middlesmoor and Ripley, which are open 24 hours a day. 

Previously, all the toilets would be cleaned before being locked for the night, a process which started two hours before the final closure time. During the winter months, that meant that the earliest toilets to shut would be closed at around 4pm; during summer, at 6pm. 

But according to our council sources, the new schedule has the cleaning rota starting at two o’clock, meaning that some toilets are shut for the night as early as 3pm. The last one, in Victoria car park next to Harrogate railway station, still shuts at 6pm.

Photo of the Starbeck public toilets.

The public toilets in Starbeck – locked by mid-afternoon.

‘No change’, says council 

However, North Yorkshire Council denied that there had been any change to the cleaning or closing schedule. In a statement, Cllr Greg White, the council’s executive member for managing our environment, told us: 

“We understand the importance of our public conveniences to both residents and visitors and work hard to ensure they are available when and where they are required. 

“Since the formation of North Yorkshire Council in April last year we have not implemented any policy changes and, as such, the service continues to be provided as it was previously. 

“As with anything of this nature, there are occasions when individual sites will be required to close earlier than normal. This could be a result of vandalism, cleanliness or issues around staffing, for example. However, we try our best to avoid such situations and they are generally rare.” 

Given the discrepancy between our sources’ accounts and the council’s official response, the Stray Ferret set out to find the truth and this week visited a selection of public toilets – including those at Oatlands, Starbeck and Stray Ponds – between 3.30pm and 4pm. We found them all shut, apparently confirming our sources’ claims. But, in common with the council’s website, signs on the buildings claimed the toilets were open till 6pm. 

Photo of a sign on the Stray Ponds public toilets, which says that they shut at 6pm.

A sign on the Stray Ponds public toilets says they shut at 6pm.

The reader who contacted us said the new was regime was bad, but even the old schedule was not good enough. He said: 

“It’s the principle of it. The town as a collective pays so much money in rates, and for visitors coming to the town, knowing that they’ve got public conveniences should be a given. They shouldn’t have to rely on popping into some shop or pub or whatever – it’s not right. 

“The question is: is Harrogate a five-hour-a-day town, or a 24-hour-a-day town? If we want to be an open and welcoming town, we need facilities that are open at least till eight o’clock. Personally, I think they should be open till 10 or 11 o’clock at night.” 

Crisis point 

According to the British Toilet Association, which campaigns for better toilet provision throughout the UK, the issue is fundamentally about human dignity. 

Raymond Martin, managing director of the BTA, told us: 

“As humans, we need to do five things: eat, drink, sleep, breath and go to the toilet. It’s not something we can choose not to do. When our bodies say ‘go to the toilet’, we need to go to the toilet.” 

But he claimed the situation in Harrogate is symptomatic of a wider trend. He said: 

“It’s understandable but unacceptable. There’s just no funding from central government to local authorities. In 2011, the government slashed council budgets by 20% in one austere sweep, and that was where we saw the biggest dip. In 2010, we know there were 6,687 registered public toilets in the UK, but by 2017 there were just 2,526. And the situation has reached crisis point since then. Thirty-seven councils have no public toilets whatsoever.”

Photo of the Oatlands public toilets.

The Oatlands public toilets – locked by mid-afternoon.

‘Make people pay’ 

He said councils should rethink their approach to public toilets, and view them as a commercial entity. He said: 

“The simple fact is that councils don’t have the money. So they could charge 20p or 40p to use the toilets – you have to pay for everything else, so why not? Or you could sell advertising space inside them, or reduce the number of cubicles and let out the space to a newspaper stand or a taxi company. There are ways of making toilets pay. At Manchester Piccadilly railway station, they charge 30p for the toilets and made £750,000 profit in a year!” 

He said that providing and maintaining toilets to a high standard made good economic sense, helping to attract people into the town centre, especially those who were more likely to need access to a toilet at short notice. 

These include young children, older people, pregnant women and people with a wide variety of medical conditions, such as prostate cancer, muscular dystrophy, Crohn’s disease, colitis and Alzheimer’s, among others. 

He said: 

“Toilets bring footfall and allow people with disabilities to come into the town centre – that’s the purple pound. And it allows older people who may have medical conditions to go shopping too – that’s the grey pound. Without public toilets, town centres suffer as people vote with their feet. 

“It might cost £5,000 to run and maintain a toilet block over a year, but actually, that toilet block could make more than that for the council. Toilets are a generator of money, not a drain on it.” 

Minister of Poo 

Mr Martin said that ultimately, the provision of toilets had been neglected because they had not been afforded the importance they were due.  

Under the Public Health Act 1936, local authorities have a power, not a duty, to provide public toilets. 

He said: 

“The problem is that nobody has overall responsibility for toilets, so there’s no strategy. We really need a Department of Sanitation and Hygiene, as they have in France, Germany, Japan, Singapore, China, Australia and New Zealand. 

“But nobody here wants to have anything to do with toilets – cleaning them, managing them, maintaining them – right up to the top level: nobody wants to be Minister of Poo.” 

In the meantime, North Yorkshire Council said the situation would come under review as the integration process it started in April 2023 continued. 

Cllr White said: 

“As we move forward following local government reorganisation, we are keen to review our policy regarding public conveniences. 

“While we work hard to provide facilities to a standard that the public would come to expect we will look at where we can improve the overall quality of the service offered.”

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Charity seeks hosts to provide beds for homeless young people

The story is sponsored by SASH

A Yorkshire charity is looking for people within the Harrogate area to help young people facing homelessness by offering them a safe place to stay at a time of need. 

Safe and Sound Homes (SASH), offers an emergency accommodation scheme, Nightstop for 16-25 year olds at a time of crisis and longer-term and Supported Lodgings accommodation within the homes of its network of hosts. Hosts are people with a spare room and an open mind.

The young people, who are referred to SASH by local authorities and PNC (Police National Computer) checked to ensure they’re safe to place, may need emergency accommodation for just a couple of nights or a more stable arrangement for up to two years. 

One such host is Gill Lawrence, who has provided Supported Lodgings at her home in Harrogate for 11 young people over the last five years. She said: 

“I currently host a 17-year-old unaccompanied asylum-seeker, and he’s a really nice young
man. 

“One has just left after two years – that’s the longest I’ve ever hosted anyone – and I miss him now he’s gone. He left on the Sunday and on the Monday I was approached by SASH for a matching meeting for another possible placement , which just goes to show how desperately SASH needs hosts. 

“While they’re here, this is their home. They have a key and can come and go, but they’ve got to be in by a certain time.” 

Gill decided to do something to help young homeless people after a revelatory moment while watching a police documentary on TV. She said: 

“There was a young lad of 17 who had been sleeping on a bench for a few nights following a row with his parents. The police told him he couldn’t sleep there, so he asked where he could sleep, and he looked straight down the camera lens and said ‘Nobody cares’. 

“So I looked up people who did care, found SASH, and gave them a call to see if I could help. That was five years ago.” 

When she told her family and friends of her plan to house homeless youngsters, many of them were sceptical. Gill said: 

“Everybody thought I was bonkers. They said I was stupid. They said I’d be robbed, my house would be trashed, and that I’d regret it. But none of that has happened. 

““There’s a perception that young homeless people are all violent, troublesome young people, but they’re not. Circumstances have just gone wrong for them. Some of them do have troubled backgrounds, but they’re different here – they’re respectful. 

“Family breakdown is the thing they all have in common, triggered by all sorts of different things. It’s really sad. 

“At first, they’re often very much on their guard and super-anxious. That’s why I like them to stay for a while – so they relax and start to realise that it’s OK to be scared, to be vulnerable and to express emotions. A lot of them doubt themselves, lack confidence, and blame themselves for their situation. But in 99.99% of cases, it’s not their fault. 

“It’s really important that they start to feel they’re in control. Often, they’ve never had any control over anything.” 

Gill says she offers a welcoming home, but it is accompanied by a SASH house agreement which set boundaries – for example, it doesn’t allow any alcohol, or smoking in the house. She said: 

“One young lad struggled to be in by a certain time. I told him he needed to abide by the rules, and said, ‘I’m sorry for nagging’, but he said, ‘No, I like it – it shows you care’.”

That degree of engagement in the life of someone who may have a troubled background can be challenging, but Gill says it’s all worth it. She said: 

“If it doesn’t affect you emotionally, then you shouldn’t really be doing it. I won’t lie – when I started doing this, I thought it’d be like having a lodger. But it’s much more than that – and I’m glad that it is. 

“There are times when it’s taxing and frustrating, but that all gets put aside when they leave you – warm, fed and happy – having grown as a person. 

“Doing this gives the young people stability and somewhere safe to sleep, and I like to see them grow and achieve their full potential. Three of them have gone to university, one into nursing, and I’m still in touch with four of them. 

“If anyone’s thinking of hosting with SASH, I’d say just do it. Don’t let people put you off. 

“If I’d listened to my family and friends, I’d never have done it. But I’m very happy that I did, because it’s hugely rewarding.”

Find out more: 

All hosts receive a payment of £20 per night for offering Nightstop accommodation and up to £170 per week for Supported Lodgings. Full training is provided and support from SASH is available 24/7, 365 days a year.

To find out more about hosting with SASH visit www.sash-uk.org.uk/hosting

 

Business Q&A: Sophie Hartley, Sophie Likes

This is the first in a regular series of Business Q&A features that we’ll be publishing weekly.

This week, we spoke to Sophie Hartley, the owner of Sophie Likes on Beulah Street, Harrogate.

Tell us in fewer than 30 words what your firm does. 

Sophie Likes is a lifestyle shop selling quirky, design-led gifts, homeware, accessories and clothing.

What does it require to be successful in business? 

A lot of energy! Every day is different, and you need to be adaptable to keep going through anything that comes your way.

What drives you to do what you do every day? 

The shop for me is my happy place. I’m very passionate about the products I sell, and about running my own business. I never don’t want to go in to work.

What has been the toughest problem your company has had to deal with over the last 12 months? 

Every year since we opened there’s been a challenge to overcome. Lately, we’ve been renegotiating our lease, which has been a challenge, a) to get the right rent, and b) because there’s been a possibility the landlord might want to use the unit for something else. I don’t want to move, and happily, I think we’re now on the verge of signing a new five-year lease.

Which other local firms do you most admire and why? 

I admire any independent local business that has ambition and goes for it – that takes the plunge and goes for it.

I opened my shop in 2014, just after the recession. People weren’t really opening shops on the high street then – they were closing them – but I wanted to open my shop anyway. Sometimes, you just have to do what you want to do.

Who are the most inspiring local leaders? 

Sean McPartland is a successful local businessman who built up his Knaresborough-based business, Logic Fire & Security, and merged it with a national firm last year.

I was lucky enough to join Sean on the coast-to-coast cycle ride a few years ago and since then he has taken up many more challenges, including an Arctic to Africa cycle ride and is currently taking part in the Clipper Round the World yacht race.

He’s an all-round inspiring guy who is determined, bold, tenacious, loyal, and great fun too.

What could be done locally to boost business? 

I always think we could do with parking charges being reduced. I live near Knaresborough and I always think parking there is so cheap, and then I come through to work in Harrogate and it’s so expensive!

More affordable parking would really help bring more people back into the town centre. During the week, we need to do more to encourage shoppers. I think people want to get back to the high street, and lower parking charges might help them do that.

Also, I think Harrogate needs a bit more promotion. It’s a fantastic place to visit, with great bars, shops and restaurants – we’re very lucky. We get visitors coming into the shop and they often tell us how lovely it is, and that they hadn’t known about it before.

Best and worst things about running a business from Harrogate? 

Harrogate’s just a great place, isn’t it? I enjoy the flexibility and the variation – every day is different.

The downside is that sometimes things happen that you have no control over, and you have to remind yourself to look at the bigger picture. For example, if you have a quiet day in the shop in January, it’s not the end of the world. You can’t let it get you down – you just have to make the most of it and remember that other days will make up for it in the summer.

Photo of Sophie Hartley, owner of Sophie Likes, in her Harrogate shop.

Sophie Hartley

What are your business plans for the future? 

We feel we’ve ‘survived’ over the last 10 years: covid, the fire on this street a few years ago – every year there’s been something.

Now, we want to thrive, and take the business to the next level. We’re not going to do anything major, like expand, but we’re just going to do what we do, but better.

We want to be a cool place to get a shopping fix – one of Harrogate’s destinations, like Bettys.

What do you like to do on your time off? 

I’ve got three young children, so sometimes coming to the shop is time off!

I love festivals and camping, and it’s great to get away for the weekend, perhaps in the Dales.

I also have another business, a deckchair hire company called Decked Out, and that keeps me busy, especially through the summer months, when we supply festivals, weddings and events.

Best place to eat and drink locally?

I love Stuzzi. The food is great, and no matter what night of the week it is, there’s always a great atmosphere.

The Disappearing Chin, next door to Sophie Likes on Beulah Street, is a great bar and does amazing cocktails. I don’t like walking into empty bars, but the Disappearing Chin is always buzzing.

Read more:

‘Unflappable’ owls wow wedding guests with ring deliveries

Just before Christmas one year, Ryan Stocks received a phone call from an employee to tell him that one of his owls was stuck behind a church organ. 

The owl, who had been on duty at a wedding, had been spooked by something and wouldn’t come down. It had even set off a fire alarm by landing on a sensor. The trouble was, Ryan was in London but the owl was in Hull. 

After dashing up the motorway, he arrived at the church just before it shut, spotted his bird, held out his hand, whistled and waited. Within seconds, the owl glided down and the drama was over. 

Last year, Ryan’s Ripon-based company, Owl Adventures, bought Barn Owl Ring-Bearer, a Durham-based firm that was the first in the UK to hire out owls trained to deliver the rings at weddings, and he’s been busy ever since. 

The ‘Hull incident’ was a rare glitch, he explains: 

“That particular owl, it transpired, would only fly for me. I’d hand-reared it and it had latched on to me probably more than an owl normally would do. So it would fly to anyone, but only if I was present – if he could see me for comfort or confidence. But that’s just an example of how different their personalities are.” 

He adds: 

“The bride didn’t want a refund – she was just so happy that we got the owl down.” 

A former pupil of Ripon City School (now Outwood Academy), Ryan, now an experienced falconer, set up Owl Adventures in 2011 and has 15 birds: three barn owls and 12 others, including a horned owl, steppe eagle, falcon, harris hawks, pygmy owl, Indian scops owl and a white-faced owl. 

He also runs a ‘mobile zoo’, whose stars – snakes, lizards, tarantulas, a tortoise and various creepy-crawlies (his term) – all live in vivariums in his home. 

Ryan and his fiancée Dee, who is, thankfully, as enthusiastic as he is about the whole menagerie, offer several services, all animal-based, including flying shows, visits to schools and care homes. 

They even offer pest control, flying harris hawks to scare off pigeons and seagulls from industrial premises. Clients include Unilever, B&Q and Reckitt. 

But it’s the barn owl ring-bearing service that grabs people’s attention. Not because it’s unique – it may be the first service of its kind, but it’s no longer the only one – but because it’s so magical: owls make people happy.

Ryan says: 

“The best weddings are when people are laughing in the service. When I hear that before I go into the room, I think ‘this is going to be great’. You’re going to get a good reaction. 

“And some of the nicest weddings we do are some of the smaller ones really, in one of the nice wedding venues. Most of the weddings we do are outside or they are in hotels or castles or a specialist wedding venue. Because the people who are going to go for an owl are probably a bit more likely to be people who want a less traditional wedding.” 

Photo of a barn owl flying silently down the aisle as guests look on at a small church wedding.

One of Ryan’s Stocks’ owls earning its keep.

Typically, Ryan will turn up for a wedding an hour early, to ensure that he and the owl can get into position unseen – it’s supposed to be a secret, known only to the groom and best man. 

He’ll then quickly train the owl-receiver to do his bit, and at the right point in the ceremony will slip into the back of the church, and release the owl. The best man, wearing a previously concealed glove, receives the owl, the rings are delivered, and the bride, hopefully, is delighted. 

Some clients ask him to have the owl deliver notes, which isn’t great, he says: 

“They have to be folded up really tiny, because something flat like that will cause a bit of drag on the bird.” 

After the ceremony, Ryan and his owl stick around to entertain guests and be photographed. 

They can do up to three weddings a day in high season, as well as other shows, so he alternates the owls, Juno, Bailey, Sweep and Dusty. They’ve performed all over the UK, and even have a booking in Greece later this year. 

Photo of a happy bridge and groom, who is wearing a falconry gautlet and a white barn owl is perching on his hand.

Photo: Camilla Armstrong.

He says: 

“It feels busy now and it’s winter. Summer frightens me, because we’ll have five things a day sometimes. We might have one pest-control hawk going out to a factory, we might have two static display events, one flying show and two weddings. Logistically, it’s quite a challenge. You just think, ‘please don’t get ill, please don’t have a vehicle breakdown’!” 

Most of the time, the owls behave – Ryan says it’s as if the glove is magnetic – but occasionally things don’t go to plan, as happened in Hull. 

He even had one owl that was agoraphobic, and didn’t like flying outside. 

“We didn’t use that one for weddings – we just found it a suitable home. That’s quite rare.

“We hand-rear them, and have dogs around them, and music and noise, so they’re very much used to noise and distraction. 

“Some of the shows we do – game fairs, steam rallies, dog shows, horse shows, stunt shows – are really noisy, and there can even be people firing guns. And you just think ‘they won’t fly in this’, but they don’t care. They’re so used to people, and things that people get up to, that they’re just not bothered by it at all.” 

You could say they’re… unflappable. But that’s not to say they don’t need looking after. They have a varied diet – cockerel chicks, mice, rats, rabbit, quail, all frozen and delivered by truck – and Ryan checks their health and weighs them daily. He says: 

“They live about three times as long in captivity as they do in the wild. One reason is that they’re not eating any poison or disease in the prey they catch. A pigeon can carry up to 21 diseases, and the poison that can be used against rodents can be dangerous too. 

“The thing about birds is that they don’t look ill until the very end. So capturing things really early, be it bumblefoot or frounce, or one of those common things, is vital.” 

Fortunately, he’s pretty good at that. In fact, when he goes to goes to the vets in Ripon, they sometimes ask him his opinion. 

He says: 

“They invite me into their examination rooms to look at the bird. I feel like a fraud – I’m not a vet! – but I know more about birds of prey than they do.” 

Ryan and his feathered employees are proof, if it were needed, that the science and art of falconry may be ancient, but it hasn’t stood still. In fact, each of the owls is even fitted with a GPS gadget. He says: 

“I hope never to have to rely on it, but it’s a wise precaution – just in case one of them ever decided to make off with the rings!”

Read more:

Should we wind the clock back and return the Stray to nature?

Arriving in Harrogate by road for the first time, the Stray makes for a pleasant surprise: a vast expanse of green land cradling the town centre, fringed around the edges by mature trees and, in spring, swathes of crocuses and daffodils. 

But it wasn’t always like this, and some believe it shouldn’t be any more – that we should turn the clock back to a time when the Stray was a bit more… wild.

The author of Robinson Crusoe, the 18th-century writer Daniel Defoe, wrote that what is now the Stray was a “most desolate out-of-the-world place”, and a century before, a Dr Stanhope – who discovered the chalybeate spring at St John’s Well in 1631 – described it as a “rude barren moor”. 

It was a place of “grassland, gorse, marsh, heather and peat”. There might have been the odd boulder and a sparse scattering of trees – birch, hawthorn and rowan, perhaps, with a few bilberry bushes too. 

It had areas of standing water, as exist to this day after heavy rain, and was boggy in parts, where springs came to the surface. Large flocks of lapwings — tewits, in Yorkshire dialect — would congregate, and even gave their name to one of the area’s most famous wells.

Photo of a lapwing (Vanellus vanellus), showing its iridescent plumage and long crest.

Lapwings, or tewits, used to flock in great numbers on the Stray, giving one of its most famous wells its name. Photo: Steve Garvie/Creative Commons.

If you think all that sounds messy and impractical, you’ll probably want to stick to the lawn-and-crocus look. But if you think it sounds beautifully natural – a healthy hotbed of biodiversity – you might want to take steps to get it back, at least in part. 

So should we return our 200 acres – or some of them – to something approximating their original state? Should we rewild the Stray? 

Support for rewilding

Shan Oakes is a fan of the idea. She’s a long-standing member of Harrogate and District Green Party, which successfully campaigned for wildflowers to be planted around the edges of the Stray in 2020. It’s something the council has repeated in subsequent years – and intends to continue this year – and has met with a largely positive reaction from the public. She says: 

“It sounds brilliant. To have a massive swathe of grass that needs mowing seems so unimaginative when you could have something a lot more natural and biodiverse instead. 

“The Stray was originally part of the Forest of Knaresborough, and hunting forests weren’t just made up of trees – there would be woodland and glades and rides – so it would be quite varied. Perhaps we could have a bit of wetland to bring back the lapwings that used flock here.”

She has an ally in Dr Steve Carver. He is a senior lecturer in geography at the University of Leeds and an expert in the field, co-chairing the rewilding group for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. He told the Stray Ferret: 

“The Stray isn’t big enough to properly rewild, and I’d hesitate to use the term ‘rewilding’ in this context, anyway – it conjures up visions of wolves and lynx.

“But you could talk about habitat creation, or nature restoration. There are big chunks of it that could be re-naturalised. You could make it a space that more people could enjoy, and which would be a bit more interesting than it is now. Then again, I can imagine a lot of clutching of pearls within a Harrogate context.” 

Photo of buttercups on a summer's day in a 'rewilded' part of West Park Stray.

Buttercups in one of the wilded areas around the edge of the Stray.

‘The uniqueness of the Stray is worth protecting’

Judy d’Arcy Thompson chairs the Stray Defence Association. Its website refers to the “neat, tidy and immaculate acres” of the Stray, and that’s exactly how she wants it to stay. She is not a fan of the wildflower cultivation, calling its late-summer phase a “bloody mess”. 

She has for many years been at the forefront of efforts to preserve the integrity and look of Harrogate’s “green lung”, opposing any novel uses or applications for the land – and she is distinctly sceptical of the suggestion that the Stray could benefit from a more natural approach to land management for the sake of biodiversity. 

She says: 

“The Stray is right at the heart of the town, and one of the joys of it is that people can have that huge expanse of green to walk on, run on, play on, sit on and enjoy. I call it our Natural Health Service. 

“I just think the uniqueness of the Stray is worth protecting.” 

She adds: 

“I’m not anti-biodiversity, but how much biodiversity do you need? Once people start doing this kind of thing, it starts to snowball: ‘Well, if we can have that bit, perhaps we can have that bit too’. If you start to nibble away at it, where does it end? The danger is that we could end up with the Stray being taken over by this.” 

Dr Carver readily acknowledges that renaturalising all 200 acres of the Stray would not necessarily be desirable, but thinks a more nuanced strategy could work. He says: 

“You could take a compartmentalised approach, and create patches of wilder areas. You could retain the football fields and the crocuses around the edge, keeping the things that people like, but also do something different with the bits that people have less interaction with. There’d be something for everyone – it could be a win-win.” 

He cautions that the results wouldn’t be instant, and the process would need to be helped along through “assisted regeneration”, where seedlings of appropriate species are planted in likely spots. He says: 

“You could have a mixed mosaic of heather, grass and early succession trees – in other words, the species that first colonised the land after the last ice age – such as birch, rowan and juniper, which if you let nature take its course, would eventually give way to later succession trees such as oak.

“If you gave it a helping hand, it would probably come on in leaps and bounds, and you’d soon see a massive increase in bird species. Over a period of five, 10, 20 years, it would show huge changes.

“Whether people would like it would be down to personal preference, but wildlife would certainly like it.”

An aerial photo showing a planked track bending through the rewilded landscape of Grote Netewoud in Belgium.

A track bends through the rewilded landscape of Grote Netewoud in Belgium (also shown in main image) – could parts of the Stray look like this? Photo: Wim Dirckx/Natuurpunt.

Wildlife might like it, but Harrogate in Bloom’s Pam Grant wouldn’t. As far as she’s concerned, there’s nothing wrong with the Stray as it is. She says: 

“To me as a Harrogatonian, the Stray is an open space and it needs to stay that way. I certainly wouldn’t want to see any trees blocking the view. There are plenty of trees already.

“The beauty of the Stray is the neatness and tidiness of it. When you come into Harrogate, it’s the first thing you see, and it’s beautiful. Personally, I wouldn’t have any wilding at all.”

Neat v messy

And therein lies the yawning gulf between the two sides: a difference both in aesthetic values – one side likes neatness and the other prefers nature’s messiness – and also in the two sides’ approaches to change: one side wants to preserve the status quo, while the other prefers a more progressive approach. 

But at the heart of the matter is the two sides’ respective attitudes to the environment, which for Dr Carver and Ms Oakes is of paramount importance. A glance at the data shows why. 

In its State of Nature 2023 report, the World Land Trust called the UK “one of the most nature-depleted countries on Earth”. Among G7 countries, it’s the worst by a huge margin. 

Since 1970, the distribution in England of pollinators has declined by 22%. Among species found on land and in freshwater, there has been an average 32% decline, and the distribution of flowering plants has dropped by a staggering 64%. 

More than one in eight (13%) species in England is threatened with extinction. Numbers of lapwings – that formerly iconic Stray bird – have plummeted by 50% over the last 40 years. 

Dr Carver says a more naturalised Stray could help the situation is a modest way, by providing more habitat for a variety of species currently absent, and by putting in place a wildlife corridor stretching almost unbroken from Beaver Dyke, west of Harrogate, right through to Knaresborough. 

But Ms d’Arcy Thompson says the Stray already does that job: 

“If Harrogate was a much more industrialised, paved-over town, I might be more interested, but we have 18 parks and lots of large gardens, so we actually do quite well for biodiversity. The Stray has 2,500 trees – we counted them – and there’s a lot of birdlife in those, as well as shrubs, bushes and plants, so it’s quite a good corridor.” 

Photo of crocuses on West Park Stray in Harrogate.

The traditionalists’ preference: crocuses on West Park Stray.

Another of her objections concerns public safety. She said: 

“The anti-social blighters who love to discard their detritus – litter, needles, little gas canisters, broken bottles, used condoms and the rest – would do it in knee-high grass, where you’d never see it. People can’t even find their own dog’s poo in the wilded areas around the edge. 

“One of the lovely things about the Stray is that parents can let their little children run around safely. Imagine your toddler coming out of the long grass clutching a hypodermic needle!” 

So ponds are out of the question, then? 

“Little children and ponds do not mix well. Why should the Stray need ponds? Why can’t people just leave it alone? They’ve gone biodiversity-mad!” 

‘We always keep this under review’

In the middle of the discussion – between the ‘blue’ corner and ‘green’ corner – stands North Yorkshire Council as arbiter, deciding how the Stray is managed, from what trees are planted to when the grass is mown. 

It has planted two “pocket woods” of native species in recent years, the most recent just this winter, and has said it will continue to keep the wildflowers strips, but otherwise it appears the status quo is winning. The Stray Ferret asked the council if it intended to introduce any more changes to the upkeep of the Stray, especially any that might affect biodiversity. 

Jonathan Clubb, the council’s head of parks and grounds, told us: 

“There are no plans to change current maintenance regimes on the Stray at the present time, but we will always keep this under review to ensure good practice.” 

What “good practice” looks like is clearly debatable, but in the meantime, Shan Oakes just hopes people will keep an open mind and think about the possibilities. She says: 

“It would be nice to have a big public conversation about how we can manage the Stray for everyone’s enjoyment.

“There seems to be a stranglehold on the conversation – ‘the Stray is the Stray’ – but we need it discussed more openly. I think you’d get a lot of good ideas.”

Read more:

Harrogate surveyors Kempston-Parkes expands offices

This story is sponsored by Kempston-Parkes Chartered Surveyors.

Harrogate’s foremost firm of chartered surveyors is bucking the property market trend and actively growing in response to continued healthy demand. 

While many in the sector are battling falling house prices, subdued trade and high interest rates, Kempston-Parkes Chartered Surveyors has seen no downturn in revenues and is investing in its future. 

To better accommodate its growing team, Kempston-Parkes has expanded into the ground and basement offices of its Princes Square premises after the former tenants moved out. 

Managing director Andrew Kempston-Parkes, who founded the firm from his home in 2011, said: 

“We’re growing as a firm, so when the lease became available, Kempston-Parkes saw it as a great opportunity to secure more space for our expanding team.

“It will give our admin team more room, and occupying the whole building provides us with an even better presence in Harrogate’s central business quarter.”

Mr Kempston-Parkes earned his professional qualifications from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) in 1997 and founded Kempston-Parkes Chartered Surveyors 14 years later. The firm now employs 14 people from its offices in the heart of Harrogate. 

Find out more:

Kempston-Parkes Chartered Surveyors provide surveys and valuations for all purposes, including purchase, inheritance tax, capital gains tax, matrimonial assessments, boundary disputes and Land Registry plans

To find out more, visit our brand-new website, www.kempston-parkes.co.uk, or call us on 01423 229333.