Ormeau Baths
Day 2 began with a trip to the Ormeau Baths. On entering, we met Claire who initially talked to us about the business before giving us a tour of the building and its history. After our tour Ian and Paul talked to us a little bit about their business journey and what their current aims.
Grand Central Hotel
At the Grand Central we were greeted with tea, coffee and brownies. After our nourishments Howard Hastings explained the running of the Hastings Hotel businesses and explained his own pathway into entrepreneurship, which he began as an accountant before taking over the family business. To follow, Jeremy Fitch talked to us about the role of Invest NI
Another highlight was being taught to make mocktails by a bartender, he made it very fun involving us in making them and letting us all try each of them. To finish, we were treated to lunch. We were served chicken goujons and chips as well as sausage rolls and sandwiches.
Zack Surphlis
East Side Partnership:
The third place we visited today was the East Side Partnership where Michele Bryans gave us a tour, explaining that the partnership is a social enterprise whose main aim is to help the community instead of making a profit.
Michelle went into detail about how they aim to improve areas of deprivation in East Belfast and the quality of life in the area. Moreover, she explained how East Side Partnership aims to do this by turning East Belfast into a more welcoming area and a destination for tourism and leisure.
Finally, Michele went on to talk about some of the plans East Side Partnership have for the future, such as extending the building in which we enjoyed a presentation and building a new tourism complex with 12 bedrooms.
Hyster-Yale:
Our final visit of the day was to Hyster-Yale located in Craigavon. On arrival we were greeted by four employees: Jonathan, Jonny, Rachel and Darren. Darren went over the history of the business, explaining that they build fork lifts for global export. Jonathan, Jonny and Rachel went on to describe their journeys to Hyster-Yale, highlighting the variety of career paths within the business. The common theme was the importance of placement.
Finally, we were lucky enough to get a tour of the factory, seeing how the fork lifts were made, from beginning to end. It was very interesting to see all the different techniques, machines and technology used throughout the production process.
Thank you to everyone who gave up their time to accommodate us today; it was enlightening and great fun, and we had excellent food, too!
Aaron Russell