We were absolutely delighted to bring our franchisees and head office team together last month for our inaugural conference to celebrate the Rise journey to date and lay down ambitious growth plans for the future.
With franchise teams now located across the UK, we held the event centrally at Chesford Grange Hotel in Kenilworth, kicking off the day with a presentation from Trevor Brocklebank looking back at how far we have come.
Never taking things too seriously, Trevor presented Debbie Heffernan (Epsom) with the Start a Movement Award, – presented to her as the person who had the foresight to get on board as our first franchisee. Thank you Debbie for putting your faith in us!
And it didn’t stop there. Caz Favager (Southport), who has recently taken on the additional role of Head of Quality, received the Usain Bolt Award in recognition of ‘getting out of the blocks in super-fast time and setting a new record for the number of sessions delivered’.
Continuing the sporting theme, Pam Gordon (Brighton) was named winner of the Michael Jordan Award for her almost fivefold increase (or jump – see what we did there?) in revenues during 2023.
Paul Pitchford and Scott Marsh were presented with the Serena Whiteman Award for building a team of Activity Leads, enabling more residents of Nottingham to score goals.
A number of breakout sessions allowed delegates to explore growth opportunities, recruitment and retention of Activity Leads and their ‘To Do’ lists, outlining key actions for the year ahead.
Video and photography coach, Kevin Aires, joined us for a fantastic session on capturing great still and video imagery. Our is a business centred around people and movement and there is no better way to showcase the impact our sessions have than by capturing them on film.
Caz then ran a very energetic Rise session (turns out our franchisees are very competitive) to allow us to put our new photography and videography skills into practice.
After wrapping up the formal part of the day we took a quick break before meeting up for a lovely evening meal.
Speaking about the day, Trevor said, “As a franchise business it’s really important to get everyone together. Ours is very much a people business and we are keen to nurture connections between our franchise teams as they each have a different perspective.
“It was rewarding to see them sharing ideas and supporting each other during the day and I know that these connections will pay dividends as we work together to grow the Rise franchise brand.”
