CHAIRMAN’S NEWSLETTER – February 2010
Dear Members of the Port of Penryn Chamber of Commerce:
Firstly, I would like to welcome six new members: Tina Westall of Kernick Supplies, Alex Cockle of Kernow Music School, Nick Swallow, Environmental Consultant, Barbara Bole, Ival Ferrier of Tristan Garage, Janie (?) Smith of 8Wire design. [check]
As I keep telling everybody I meet, these days nobody listens if you’re just one person – it’s very important to get together with other businesspeople so we can have a more united and therefore louder voice. The Chamber of Commerce exists to promote, support and if necessary protect all businesses in Penryn. We want to know what you need – what would help you to conduct business better, to weather the recession and expand in the future? You can email me with suggestions or write letters – better still you could attend our meetings and tell us direct! We have plans for special Chamber meetings which might even include the proverbial knees-up in a brewery!
One fund-raising event that we are planning would be a Penryn Pasty Party to take place during Mayor Mary May’s Penryn Week at the end of July, with a cup for the Best Pasty and perhaps some other prizes. We would love to hear from anyone, member or not, who has ideas or suggestions for this.
One subject that keeps coming up over and over, and has done for years, is the problem of parking in Penryn. It’s a very difficult matter and one the Town Council has been deliberating for years as well.
The fact is, the centre of Penryn was built at a time when a horse and cart was the largest vehicle that might need to come through and when most people walked everywhere (and were a lot healthier for it). Nowadays even perfectly fit people want to park right outside the place they want to visit and not walk at all – and I’ve been just as guilty of this kind of thinking. This causes disruption to everyone else and can even be dangerous. Nobody wants to pay for parking but free carparks then suffer from people who leave their cars in the same spot for weeks at a time. There’s a tension between the needs of residents to park their car near where they live, the needs of people who work in Penryn and the needs of shoppers who might want to come to the shops. Supermarkets understand this and provide acres of free carparking precisely in order to attract customers who like the convenience – which then takes away business from the centre of Penryn.
We are in urgent need of some genius-level ideas to solve this problem. The simple answer would be to build a multi-storey carpark – but where could it go in a small pretty town like Penryn without ruining the place? An out of town park-and-ride facility might help – but wouldn’t that then take more trade out of the town?
Obviously, the ideal solution would be to provide magic shrinking boxes for all the cars in Penryn which would shrink the cars to the size of Matchbox toys so that they could then be stacked on the pavements until needed. I’ll be sorting that one out just as soon as Mr Harry Potter gets back to me!
CHAIRMAN’S EXTRA NEWSLETTER – mid-January 2010Dear Members of the Port of Penryn Chamber of Commerce:
We had a lovely Christmas dinner on Wednesday 13th January at the King’s Arms, Penryn – all the better for being late, I say. That wasn’t due to lack of organisation either: we have our dinner late because most of us are so rushed off our feet in the weeks before Christmas. January is much more relaxed and pleasant and indeed it was a very convivial evening, ably catered by Paul Chambers and his staff.
However, it’s lucky nothing ever puts me off my food because that was when I heard the appalling news (also in the Falmouth & Penryn Packet this week) that there were apparently plans to close off Helston Road for seven weeks from April 2010 so that the wall between the Helston Road and West Street could be strengthened.
Since this would be the fourth year in a row that there has been massive traffic disruption in the centre of Penryn during the summer tourist period, I went ballistic. There was a meeting planned for the day after by Penryn’s Mayor, Mary May, and so I contacted as many of the retailers on Market Street and Broad Street as I could, although I wasn’t sure what kind of a meeting it was!
Annemarie Hollis, our President, was able to be there and so was Michael Moore who has been a leading light of the Council and Vision committee for many years. Thanks to Mary May’s help, we and several retailers were able to sit down and clarify some important points with the Engineer, Angela Holmes, who was charming and very helpful.
Firstly, the work needs to be done because the wall is having to take the weight of the lorries and tankers going up the Helston road as well as the weight of the cars parked there. Secondly, there is no great urgency, although the top of the wall is bulging slightly. As far as it’s possible to tell, no bits are likely to fall off and the wall is not presently in danger of collapsing. It’s just that that particular job has come to the top of the list and the budget will be available for the new financial year April 2010 to March 2011.
I made the point that in a recession which may not affect bankers, but does affect businesspeople in Penryn, massive traffic disruption for the fourth year running could well be the final straw for some of the businesses in the centre of town. Was there any way the work could be done at a less damaging time of year than Easter?
It seems that it could. We agreed that January to mid-February 2011 could be investigated as a better and less destructive time to do the job. Jean Sutcliffe made the point that it was a pity the wall hadn’t been strengthened during the South West Water works that seemed to go on for ever last summer.
Speaking of which – is there anyone else out there who is planning to dig up Penryn this summer? I’m not joking: let’s try and do this joined-up thinking everyone talks about and organise it so it does less damage to businesses.
It’s hard work though very satisfying to run your own small business, but it can be soul-destroying when your income drops by half as a result of local government obliviousness to your problems. If you work in local government, think about this: you wouldn’t like it if your income was halved due to roadworks or some other unpredictable but planned activity. If the disruption can be made predictable and timed for a less busy season, that can make the difference to small businesses between survival and bankruptcy.
Patricia Finney
CHAIRMAN’S NEWSLETTER – January 2010
Dear Members of the Port of Penryn Chamber of Commerce:
As is now traditional we will be having our Christmas Dinner well after Christmas - on Wednesday, the 13th January 2010 at 7.00 for 7.30 at the King’s Arms in Penryn – the cost of the three-course meal plus coffee and mints will be £14.95. It would be helpful if we could have an idea of numbers so, if you are planning to come, please contact me by email or on 01872 264656 or text 07704 173745 before the 9th January 2010.
Secondly, please tell us what the Chamber can do to help you and you and your business even if you don’t have time to come to meetings – feel free to email me on patriciafinney@btinternet.com with anything that comes to mind. The Chamber of Commerce can be a tremendous force for good as we stop being solitary traders with no backing and become a united voice – our aim is to promote, support and protect all businesses in Penryn.
Finally, many apologies for the non-notification of the date and agenda of the last meeting. I tried to do it by email and... well, I could blame the mess on my normal pet email-gremlin but that would be cowardly. I could blame it on my Secretary, but unfortunately I don’t have one yet. I’ll just blame it on General Confusion and Major Foul-up, those two well-known criminals, and leave it at that.
So this month I am aiming to notify all members both by snailmail/hand delivery and by email. If you get one without the other (or, indeed, neither!), would you please contact me so I can update our records and make sure everyone is fully informed in future.
Patricia Finney
Chairman
Penryn Christmas Windows Competition 2009Thank you so much to all who entered the Penryn Christmas Window Competition, sponsored by the Penryn Chamber of Commerce. This year there were thirteen entrants who had all clearly taken a lot of time and trouble to decorate their windows and two extras who had to be included because they had clearly put in just as much effort. The theme this year was the Holly and the Ivy – some of the entries were witty, some were quite beautiful, some were lovely and Christmassy. They made a very rainy and windy Penryn look so welcoming and seasonal. Many thanks also to David and Carol Ryall who carefully looked at every single window and eventually came to a very difficult decision. Tied in first place were Interior Dynamics with a beautiful, mysterious-looking display of running deer from the carol and Christopher Rose, solicitors, with a charming winter scene complete with polar bear. In the end, and after much discussion, Christopher Rose just edged in front because of “Christmassy-ness”. As the new Chairman of the Port of Penryn Chamber of Commerce, I thoroughly enjoyed the evening – and the rain even held off for the lantern parade! Merry Christmas Patricia Finney Chairman MacSalvador's entry in the 2009 Penryn Traders' Christmas Window Competition 
Outrage! Horror! Fiasco! Flare-up!
When Intel selfishly named their new chip “Penryn” did they think of the consequences for the little town of Penryn in Cornwall? Specifically for the Chamber of Commerce website which has been pushed right down the Google listings by it? They did not. They just merrily went ahead and expropriated our name and wantonly, nay flagrantly used it without a by-your-leave or a royalty payment.
I think Penryn Town should get a royalty of 0.01 % on every Penryn chip sold which will make us all as rich as a Saudi prince so we can afford some decent signposts to tell people where the town is. Also I think we should sue them for unauthorised use of the name before they sue us. I will be consulting my lawyers.
Next – please note that the Chamber of Commerce contact details have changed:
The new address is:
Port of Penryn Chamber of Commerce
Waterside House
Falmouth Road
TR10 8BE
The old phone number is no longer in use: you can contact us via the website on admin@penryn-chamber.co.uk or by phoning the President, Chairman ( 01326 376214) or Acting Secretary (see Contact page).
|
| Executive