Q1
West & North Yorkshire Business
34 BUSINESS SUPPORT
Sharing skills to start-up success National Safety Inspections (NSI) was the brainchild of former school friends Andy Stoner and Dan Coombe. The pair went their separate ways for ten years once they left school, but always kept in touch; with Dan being Andy’s best man. Dan was working in sales in Scotland and Andy was working in electrical testing in Leeds, when in 2017 a chance conversation led them to realise they had the perfect combination of skills to create a start-up, with Dan having extensive sales experience from medical sales to solar panels, and Andy having knowledge of electrical safety, and knowing few companies specialised purely in electrical testing. Dan says: “Out of the blue me and Andy spoke to each other about the idea of setting up and just offering testing, and then we just said, let’s do it. So, I moved back to Leeds. “We were ambitious to be national even as a start-up. That’s why we called ourselves National Safety Inspections, even though we were just in a little office in the city.” Initially the company worked for a few student letting agencies, but they knew that new laws coming in 2020 would lead to many more opportunities. The new rules meant every private landlord would have to have electrical checks on their properties every five years.
Project objectives One of the biggest issues with electrical testing and certification is the amount of paperwork, which is one reason most companies do it as a side-line only, concentrating on installation work for most of their income. But Andy and Dan saw the gap in the market and wanted to get ahead of the game before the new law came in. They knew they needed a bespoke CRM system to make the process efficient. They also wanted their engineers to be able to work easily while out in the field, so needed equipment, including tablets and laptops. And they needed a professional looking website with excellent SEO. They approached AD:VENTURE for growth grants and also for business development support.
Results NSI were successful in applying for two grants through the AD:VENTURE programme, one in March 2019 for £4,300 towards a CRM system, and one in February 2020 at just over £14,000 for website development, SEO and brochures, and for equipment including tablets and laptops for engineers, alarms for vans and testing kits.
