The Partnership

Working in partnership is a hugely successful strategy for the preservation of our town and city centres; it is a well known fact.  So, consider the power and the positive outcomes that will come from the some of the best brains in retail, high street regeneration, BID development, crowdfunding, marketing, area based loyalty and digital technology all working together under the Revive & Thrive Partnership

Alongside Directors Hannah Bowden and Mark Barnes, the Revive & Thrive Partnership is a group of selected professionals  with unrivalled passion for their areas of expertise.  Committed to doing rather than debating, the Partnership provides your community with solutions, projects, training, products, innovation and strategy to address any local risk or threat and enable you to create new opportunities for your high streets

Contact Mark or Hannah to discuss your needs and how the Revive & Thrive Partnership can work with you in your area

Jean Ball, place, destination and events specialist

Jean Ball MIPM is a professional place, destination and events manager with a passion for town and city centres and for collaborative working. Jean has extensive experience in logistics and operations, marketing and tourism including creating and delivering major cultural and sporting events. Author of 100 Ways to Help the High Street and advisor to over 30 Town Teams in the Midlands, Jean provides training and support for developing sustainable places and partnerships.

Jean grew up in her parent’s independent shop and later worked in management roles for The Body Shop and Conran Groups. She also set up a successful wholesale to retail business so has a great understanding of the retail industry from all sides.

A systems thinker with an eye for detail, Jean has an engaging manner, extensive network and a commitment to ethical commerce.

Mark Barnes, Managing Director Revive & Thrive Ltd

Mark is recognised and respected across the UK for the development of successful communities, high street loyalty schemes and promoting local businesses. Having spent many years delivering and researching high street loyalty solutions from lo-tech to hi-tech including mobile loyalty solutions and contactless technology, he is a well known pioneer of new and effective loyalty solutions aimed at delivering real results for businesses and high streets.

Previously a Town Centre Manager, Mark has achieved excellent results for town centres though engaging with residents and retailers.  Mark has a  specialism of area based loyalty solutions, which combined this with his knowledge of high streets ensures that he is perfectly placed to offer or advise on the most effective and sustainable solutions for rewarding positive behaviour, increasing footfall and transaction value and measuring success.

Away from high streets, Mark has a wide range of management, customer care and sales experience. Mark is also an excellent networker and creates opportunities for all those who he is connected with

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Tina Boden, Micro Business Specialist, Independent Business Ambassador, Strategist, Networker, Collaborator, Speaker, Writer 

Tina is 3^rd generation self-employed and has been running her own businesses for nearly 25 years, since the age of 21. Property Letting & Management, Construction, Hospitality and Retail, all with a strong focus on customer service, are the sectors Tina has business experience in.  

Only Me Here, one of Tina’s current businesses works with micro organisations – businesses, charities and social enterprises – to help them develop and flourish. In January 2012 she co-founded Enterprise Rockers with Tony Robinson OBE, an independent community interest company they co-fund to make life in micro business better. Tina has been a Trustee of Ellie’s Fund – Brain Tumour Trust, since the charity was formed in September 2010. She gives back 20% of her time to voluntary work with charities and good causes of all different sizes helping with strategy, fundraising or event needs.

Tina is also Non Executive Director of The BEACH, Scarborough. As well as speaking at events or writing articles for national publications on both micro and independent business Tina enjoys MCing and compering events both large and small. In her spare time, in the winter months, you are most likely to find her up a mountain enjoying skiing with her family.

In 2012, as a commitment to what she believes in, Tina pledged to only buy her goods and services from independent businesses and now spends around 95% of her shopping budget with them; she also spends time helping others understand the benefits of supporting their local economy – shop local and donate local are tow of her mantras .

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Hannah Bowden, Director for Strategy and Innovation, Revive & Thrive Ltd

Hannah has more than 15 years of experience working in business development, marketing, and web development in the software and regeneration sectors.

After graduating from Edinburgh University in the late 90’s Hannah spent 7 years working internationally in the software industry, helping to grow a New York AI company developing text filtering software for the financial services and later in Central Europe with a company which combined database processing with human intelligence for financial information providers.

A small stint in ecommerce for the family textiles company was a stepping stone into the regeneration sector where Hannah spent a number of years at Action for Market Towns. Whilst with AMT, amongst other projects, Hannah was responsible for the design and project management of the Better Welcome, a three year, million pound programme across 28 towns in the West Midlands. Hannah set up AMT’s social enterprise consulting arm, including branding, web development, marketing and sales. She created an online toolkit for partnerships and latterly researched and wrote two reports into local loyalty and town centre revival.

Most recently Hannah was working freelance on eCommerce and web development projects in the retail sector.

John Burrows, B. Arch RIBA ARB,  Architect and built environment specialist

 Qualified in 1980, John Burrows is Founder and Director of Burrows Little, an international architectural practice based in London. He is a member of the RIBA and the ARB and Vice Chairman of the LPF.

John has extensive experience in retail, entertainment and mixed-use developments worldwide.  Since designing his first retail project in 1987, he has worked throughout the UK and mainland Europe, Asia, the MENA regions and America.

Specifically, in the UK he has worked with blue-chip clients such as Westfield, Pradera, Henderson Global, Lend Lease, London Clubs International and Heron International as well as many local authorities

John enjoys public speaking and lives in London with his wife and two daughters.

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Health Cormack, experienced business architect specialising in innovation management

Technology Innovation strategist  Heath Cormack has worked in technology roles at a number of the UK’s leading retailers, offers some thoughts on how the emergence of digital in recent years has empowered customers. 

He has led as the strategic consultative bridge (customer’s champion) between IT and global businesses by providing insights advisory services in areas such as product, finance, retail, marketing and to deliver change improvements

His experience includes designing global strategic solutions by identifying business needs and determining requirements against processes, identifying strategic linkages and information systems that require changing and ensuring new solutions deliver quantified benefits in line with the strategic visions.

Diane Cunningham, marketing specialist

Diane is a seasoned marketing and business development professional with more than 15 years’ experience. 

Passionate about high streets, she has been working with Chatsworth Road in east London for more than three years. Her work with them includes developing a street market and a communications programme. She has also worked with the Corporation of London covering the district bordering the city and Southwark, while outside London she cut her teeth with Marketing Manchester.

Away from high streets, Diane has worked in marketing at a senior level for a diverse range of organisations primarily in financially driven plcs and through her own consultancy for start-ups, SMEs and social enterprises.

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Chris Gregory, Town Centre Management & BIDs specialist

Chris brings a wealth of experience to Revive & Thrive, having worked as a Town Centre Management practitioner for almost 20 years within a number of diverse locations including Solihull, Walsall, Stratford-upon-Avon and Andover. 

As a Town Centre Manager and a Business Improvement District (BID) Director, Chris has developed and led award winning initiatives and recent achievements spearheaded by Chris have included:

• Major town centre events and festivals attracting upwards of 30,000 people.
• Focused and targeted marketing campaigns.
• Significant environmental and streetscene improvements.
• Safety & security projects.
• Grant funding & sponsorship generation.
• Management of teams of up to 15 staff.
• Establishment of a new Town Centre Partnership.
• Delivery of a positive BID ballot resulting in income of over £2 million.

Chris is passionate about people and places and brings an engaging, informed, professional and warm style to his projects.

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Barry James, crowd funding expert

Barry is an ‘instigator’. A technologist, writer, conference chair, keynote speaker and successful entrepreneur of three decades standing who has become a leading champion and thought leader in Crowdfunding in the UK and worldwide. He employs his background in psychology and systems analysis to collaborate widely to architect, design and engineer new business eco-systems, most often involving Crowdsourcing, Crowdfunding and cloud and mobile technologies.

He co-founded The Social Foundation, a social enterprise, in 2012 to further research, education and policy initiatives into the new, post-crash economy and ‘Crowdonomics’. With The Social Foundation he created and launched ‘Crowdfunding: Deep Impact’, the UK’s first national conference, in February 2013, which led to the formation of the highly influential Westminster Crowdfunding Forum which he helps lead.

He is an award winning innovator with technology patents granted in the UK, USA & internationally and co-founder and CEO of AngelRevolutions his cloud and mobile technology company.

A regular columnist for RealBusiness.co.uk he’s a frequent speaker and visiting lecturer on Crowdfunding entrepreneurship, and innovation as well as an experienced conference chair and event creator and organiser.

In 2010 he co-authored a report for the UK’s Information Commissioner on information security – or the lack of it – in the UK’s SME sector.

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Taryn Johnston, Web Design, Social Media, PR & Marketing

Taryn has over 20 years business marketing experience and has been creating websites for clients for the last 10 years. Taryn is also a mentor for the Princess Trust and runs Social Media training courses for new start up businesses.
Previously working in London as a project manager for majot telecoms companies Taryn understands time constraints and the need to get the job done!
Taryn now works with her business partner Margot to provide a comprehensive online business package
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Robin Kadrnka, Urban Regeneration Placemaking and Destination Branding Specialist

I am a placemaking and destination branding specialist working extensively in urban regeneration, mixed use developments and retail and leisure destinations. I have a great deal of international experience having lived in the US, Canada, Germany and the UK and have worked in over 15 countries in the past 20 years.

I worked at senior management level for a number of global branding businesses including Fitch and the Brand Union before starting my own company, Brand Arkade, in early 2009. I bring a breadth and depth of consumer understanding and have carried out numerous qualitative studies into the changing socio-economic and cultural landscape and its effects on consumer behaviour and the requirements for regeneration and placemaking.

I have worked on destination visioning and placemaking programmes with some of the largest developers in the UK including Land Securities, Quintain, Forth Ports, as well as numerous projects with Places for People. I have also worked alongside many other development consultants as a specialist on their multi-disciplinary teams.

I am very passionate about places, providing visions to guide their development and working alongside other like-minded specialists to make places work and to help them to thrive. I sit on the Expert Advisory Panel for Kingston University’s Business and Law School and have taught Marketing Management and Global Brand Management at Kingston University and Kingston College.

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Colin Munro, digital infrastructure specialist

Colin is the man behind miconex, with a background in online marketing working for Scottish and Southern Energy and Visit Scotland. In 2010 Colin set up miconex to create a multi-channel communications platform for towns, BIDs and local authorities. The platform connects local businesses with local consumers via web, iPhone and Android apps and social media as well as various push channels.

Having also run his own independent small business in the past, Colin truly understands the challenges facing businesses today and is passionate about helping them to sell more. Over the past 15 years he has amassed skills, expertise and knowledge which allow him to assist with the creation of digital communications strategies both for individual businesses and for organisations.

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Matthew Powell, Town Centre Management and BIDs Specialist

Matt is an experienced practitioner in the field of Town Centre Management with over ten years’ experience across a variety of towns and high streets in Bristol, Cornwall and Birmingham.

Leaving a successful career in retail in 2004, Matt trained as a Business Advisor working with pre-start and existing businesses across several inner-city locations in Bristol.  He went on to manage a team of high street managers funded by a major ERDF project to regenerate some of the most deprived areas of the city.  In this role, he was successful in securing funding from Bristol City Council, was a director of a New Deal for Communities area and oversaw a major grants programme of shop front improvements.

He subsequently moved on to manage two towns in the Cornish Heartlands and, at a time when Woolworths was going bankrupt and the RDAs were being wound up, managed to ensure that his towns were the only two in Cornwall to show year-on-year footfall increases.

In his time in Cornwall, Matt launched and ran a unique and innovative Loyalty Card scheme and project managed other initiatives such as a Mystery Shopper Campaign for independent businesses. He also brought back regular markets to these historic market towns, became the inspiration for a regional shop local campaign and managed a major marquee at the Royal Cornwall Show.

Since moving to Birmingham in 2009, Matt has worked in a number of town centres in the city.  He established a successful partnership across two centres which is currently developing proposals for a BID, set up a BID Company following a successful BID ballot and has most recently managed the whole BID process for what is now Birmingham’s largest BID (by number of businesses).

He chaired a citywide TCM network and came up with the idea for a BIDsAcademy for the city which has directly led to 5 new BIDs in Birmingham.

Matt is a champion for town centres and the High Street and is committed to helping traders, BIDs, local authorities and other interested parties to help make their areas better for residents, visitors and businesses alike.

Natasha Reid, MA, DipArch RIBA II, Spatial Design Specialist

Natasha is an experienced and innovative design practitioner, specialising in bringing spaces to life. Having worked for award- winning architecture practices since 2006, she developed her professional experience working on multi-million pound projects for developer and local authority clients across London, including major public realm and town centre regeneration projects.

Since founding her practice, Natasha Reid Design, she combines her background in architecture and urban design with an artistic slant to create imaginative, uplifting and unique spatial interventions which realise the ambitions and aspirations of places and businesses. Her expertise spans transforming and revitalising existing spaces as well as creating new, distinctive destinations, both in the public realm and within interior environments.

Passionate about providing exceptional design solutions to everyday issues and enhancing people’s experience of their environment, Natasha advocates taking an inventive and resourceful approach to maximise the impact of projects.

She is a visiting architecture and design critic to several London universities and her work has been exhibited across the UK and published internationally. She regularly speaks publically about her design approach and contemporary urban issues alongside some of the UK’s most renowned practitioners.

Lydia Schilbach, Design Manager

Lydia is the founder of Red Hen Projects, a design management consultancy set up to help communities bring about the built projects they really care about.  With a background in architecture and regeneration, she has worked on projects ranging from community gardens, refurbishments and community buildings to regeneration strategy and multi-million pound masterplans, across a range of sectors.

After coordinating an award-winning, community-led public realm scheme, it became clear that there was a big gap between the vision that communities have of the environment they would like to see and their ability to deliver it. Lydia is a strong advocate of real community engagement and works with councils, corporate organisations and local communities to help identify and work towards common goals in innovative ways.

It’s difficult to suppress Lydia’s enthusiasm for her work enabling great quality design.