UNIVERSITY NEWS LAST UPDATED : 07 JULY 2014
Birmingham City University's team Ekipa proved that they had the right credentials at the recent UnLtd UniPopshop Competition held over 3 days in London.
Unipopshop is a business selling competition and having sourced their ethical products, the students had 1 day to sell them on their stand at Spitalfields Market. The team making the biggest profit after taking account of costs, being declared the winner; with each team donating their profits to a charity or social enterprise of their choice.
In the case of Team Ekipa: Birmingham Children’s Hospital
With categories for Best Social Impact; Digital Marketing; Visual Merchandising and The overall Competition Winner, the University's team of Vladina Chira (Marketing & Advertising BA (Hons)), Maria Tahir (Business & Economics BA (Hons)) and Sukaina Al-Husseiny (Business & Economics BA (Hons)) were right at the very top.
Not only did they generate the highest revenue (over 10 times that of the last placed team) on the ‘selling day’- a very impressive performance for first time market traders – but they were also awarded the Visual Merchandising prize; all of which resulted in them coming a very credible 3rd place from 15 teams, missing out on the top slot by just a few pounds.
The Visual Merchandise category was judged by James Jardella - ex L’Oreal and was based on 3 criteria: Visual impact to draw customers to the stall; a clear communication message of the brand; a well-considered display that made shopping the range enjoyable.
James said “The stand was full of colour and well stocked with a great range of products that complemented each other well. The team had clearly taken a lot of care and pride over the customisation of their products and their packaging and that attention to detail really made a difference to their great looking stand”.
The University team were accompanied by members of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Team within (RIE) Research Innovation and Enterprise.
Ron Brown, Innovation and Entrepreneurship Manager, said: “The UniPopshop competition is a great way to practice and hone transferable entrepreneurial skills.
All the participants relished the opportunity and experience of the competition. Unipopshop is just one example of the enterprise programmes that are facilitated and run by the Innovation and Entrepreneurship team for the benefit of Birmingham City University students, graduates alumni and staff.”
To find out more about the UniPopshop competition, Enterprise programmes or other offers that are available from Innovation and Entrepreneurship contact Ron Brown or email enterprise@bcu.ac.uk.