Forward Ladies Forges International Links
16/06/2010
Forward Ladies has become an inspirational role model for French female entrepreneurs as the Orléans Chamber of Commerce launches its own version of a women’s networking and support community.
The Chamber will be launching the FAME project, aimed at female business owners, during European SME Week and Forward Ladies will take part in a live video link up into the launch evening event on the of 15th June.
The French evening will continue with a social event where female entrepreneurs, unemployed women, and students will be able to network and hear about setting up in business and hear their “ambassadors” success stories.
Margaret Wood, chairman of Wakefield First and former president of the Mid Yorkshire District Chamber, will feature in the conference as a successful businesswoman and member of Forward Ladies, alongside Forward Ladies founder Etta Cohen.
Mrs Wood took over her husband’s engineering business following his early death at the age of 47. She had given up her job many years previously to raise a family. As the company foundered and subsequently folded after his death, she decided to take what had been her husband’s vision of creating a niche company manufacturing customised doors and windows, and turn it into reality.
Since then she has had considerable success in building ICWUK Modular Glazed Systems into a very profitable, award-winning company with some high profile clients, taking it from strength to strength.
The event will be compered by French journalist Eve Chegaray, well known in her country as a business writer and presenter, and will feature female entrepreneurs and bank officials who will talk about financing new businesses.
The link has been organised by Nadia Alami, who is the Europe business advisor at the Orléans Chamber of Commerce, and who formerly worked in Bradford. She was a supporter of Forward Ladies during her time in the UK and was keen to re-establish the link.
Etta Cohen, the founder of Forward Ladies said: “We hope this will be the first of much collaboration with the Chamber, and would like to share experiences in person next time, by arranging for our members to visit France, or by hosting the Orléans businesswomen here in Yorkshire.
“This follows from our highly successful visits to the European Parliament and to European cities two years ago where we met with Belgian, Italian and Latvian businesswomen. Many of our members have gone on to trade successfully with the businesses they met during the tour, and we are keen to expand our network into Europe.”