Kāpiti Coast

42% of the people who came along to the event told us they were unemployed at the time the event started.

There was a high number (26%) of self-employed people who came to the event.

One of the key points on an entrepreneurs journey is the first sale. The first time you hold that $10 profit in your hand. This can turn out to be the catalyst that drives you forward to build your business.

We do everything we can to help people reach their first sale with 34% achieving this during the course!

At the Rebel Business School we track four main figures for people before and after the event. We ask people to rate where they are on a scale of 1-10.

Here are samples of the websites that were built, launched and developed over the course.

It is amazing how having a website so quickly helps people to feel that their business is more real.

Connecting attendees to the local business ecosystem

At the Rebel Business School Aotearoa we make sure new businesses stay connected by providing awareness of business network support in specific areas as needed. These connections are all about enabling business sustainability. Being aware of the Bookkeepers Assn NZ or Business Mentors NZ, for example, can provide business input allowing the business to strengthen its foundations and/or its direction.

The Kāpiti Coast is uniquely poised to benefit from the ongoing growth and development of the wider Wellington Region, transportation networks, and from its own outstanding natural, cultural and business heritage. The District is becoming recognised more widely as offering an attractive combination of life-style and work opportunities in a central accessible location close to the capital with good road, rail and air connectivity to other parts of New Zealand. Consequently, there is an increasing demand for housing, land and business premises on the Coast, as well as amenities and services.

Kāpiti Coast district has an Economic Development Strategy and Implementation Plan an ED Kotahitanga Board providing oversight of the implementation programme. The role of the Council’s economic development initiatives is to engage across the community to realise this potential while protecting the environment and natural ecosystems. The District’s population is growing steadily and the economy continues to perform well across most sectors compared to the national average for GDP growth, new jobs, reducing unemployment and a reducing percentage of young people not in employment, education or training (NEETs). Hence, with this underpinning economic momentum and 29% of the workforce being self-employed, it is clear that Kāpiti Coast offers a suitable environment for businesses to start up and develop into sustainable small-to-medium enterprises (and grow from there).

Economic development takes all of the factors that support this growth into account, facilitating interactions, capability building, and support networks, and providing pertinent information and in some cases, tools to enable sustainable growth. These factors require research, analysis, strategy development, and coordinated action within business groups, industries, sectors, and across key stakeholders and funders. Iwi are central to ED strategic planning being mana whenua and Treaty partners.

We asked the participants what their Lightbulb moments were at the event. Also they left the messages for our partners and assessed our team’s efforts.