1. 2013 – A Brilliant Year!

2. In 2012/13 we traded through a drop of over 55% of turnover and emerged stronger, leaner and operating profitably

3. Very few businesses would have the resilience to achieve that

4. Secured contracts totalling over £2.2million revenue and c£7million of capital

5. Exceptional Work Programme job sustainability of c78% - up there with the best in UK among Avanta sub-contractors

6. Established new Welfare Assistance services for Stockton, County Durham and Northumberland to successfully meet challenging targets and criteria

7. Secured extension to New Enterprise Allowance contract to deliver up to £2million of loans to c1500 new businesses

8. RBS SE100 ‘Impact Champion’ and one of only 10 social enterprises in the UK to score 10/10 for impact measurement

9. Highly commended in the ‘Enterprise Agency of the Year’ category at the National Enterprise Network awards 2013

10. Leading provider of non-statutory youth services in Stockton – continuing brilliant work with VIBE; All Stars; Muslim lads and Youthy… and an MB award!

11. On site with first of our 75 Empty Homes properties in Evenwood, County Durham and in Darlington

12. Delivered first few large business loans of up to £50k from our Regional Growth Fund pot of £750k capital

13. Over 1,500 MyBnk attendees and agreement with MyBnk to expand our staffing to grow the initiative further

14. Graeme Oram, won ‘Social Entrepreneur of the Year’ for the North of England in the prestigious Ernst & Young ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ 2013

15. We made over 13,000 personal loans to financially excluded people unable to access affordable credit

16. Shortlisted in ‘Best Communication’ category at 2013 NEN Awards

17. Over £1.5million of ‘Helping Hand’ loans across all 12 NE local authorities

18. Strong performance on our ‘Get On In Life (GOIL)’ project rewarded with new sub- contract to support NEET young people

19. Extended our role in a broad range of energy saving/fuel poverty initiatives – Warm Homes Healthy People; Big Community Switch; Big Energy Saving Network

20. Secured funding from Yorkshire Building Society Charitable Foundation to create a soft-play area at The Youthy

21. Employed over 30 new staff, a massive challenge which HR have delivered on, creating our strongest and most talented staff team ever

22. Successfully bid for £42k of investment funding to lead the growth to scale and impact of our colleagues at Tees Credit Union

23. Expanded our ‘FamilyWise’ delivery into Redcar & Cleveland and Middlesbrough, gaining three staff in the process

24. Bought our first house for refurbishment – 3 Chapel Street, Evenwood …… and nearly found ourselves on ‘Homes Under The Hammer’!

25. Shortlisted for CDFA ‘Citi Microentrepreneurship’ Impact Award 2014

26. CDFA ‘Inside Community Finance 2012’ shows us delivering nearly 40% of loans made in UK by their members

27. Our external auditors highlighted the exceptional performance of our finance team in managing our increasingly complex finances and also the work of our credit control and admin team within Financial Inclusion

28. Successful joint bid to Synergy securing funding for ‘Healthways’, a consortium approach to improving health outcomes of hard to reach and vulnerable groups in Stockton

29. DWP told us that 1 in 4 of NEA loans made nationally is from Five Lamps

30. Our buildings are looking better than ever thanks to our splendid caretaking and front of house teams and more people than ever are coming through the doors at South Thornaby

31. Exceptional performance on the Start-Up Loan Company contract (nearly 200 loans totalling close to £1m) has opened up further growth into North Yorkshire in 2014

32. Our contract to deliver ‘CapacityBuilders’ financial inclusion support to pre-release prisoners in HMP Kirklevington was extended and there is strong interest from other prisons

33. Strengthened relationship with ‘Smarterbuys’ to provide white goods and other household items for Welfare Assistance and Financial Inclusion services

34. Reaccredited as Investors in People Gold – a tremendous achievement for any organisation

35. Soon to be published third set of social accounts – the best yet!

36. Established our trading company ‘Conduit’, enabling surpluses to be gift-aided to the Charity

37. Completed the restructuring of our Senior Management Team with the recruitment of Director of Financial Inclusion & Housing and new structures will be fully implemented from 1 January 2014

38. Introduced our ‘Culture Champions’ initiative with representation from all parts of our business

39. Revised our Charitable Objects, with the approval of the Charity Commission, to allow us to work throughout England

40. Now ‘Creating Possibilities: Improving Lives’ for over 30,000 people per annum

41. NOW LOOKING AHEAD…

42. We want growth in all areas of our business

43. EU Structural Fund proposals totalling £17.4million have been submitted to grow Financial Inclusion; Enterprise – Access to Finance and Enterprise – Managed Workspace in the period 2014-2020. Amazingly, we are bringing over £14.4million to the table

44. Expanding our Empty Homes activity by purchasing and repairing a further 50 properties per annum and establishing a social enterprise letting and property management agency

45. Introducing a fully-functioning on-line application portal for personal loans early in 2014 with an integrated automated decision-making system and credit assessment

46. Actively seeking further investment from banks and social investors

47. Giving detailed consideration to the acquisition of other businesses to enable growth and widen our geographic reach

48. Working with partners to establish the ‘North East Social Investment Fund’ which matches Big Society Capital funding to other investment to create a possible £20million fund for social enterprises

49. Evaluating the benefits of delivering savings and other financial support and securing the relevant Financial Conduct Authority accreditation

50. Working with ‘Synergy’ the local VCS Consortium to take a prominent role in local Carers and Young Carers tenders

51. Building our asset base by securing full legal title to Eldon Street and South Thornaby

52. Developing a detailed plan for one single contact centre that spans all of our services

53. Exploring new markets like Homecare; Community Transport; Children’s Centres and more

54. Actively pursuing further growth in Welfare Assistance and related fields as wider Welfare Reforms are introduced

55. Seeking to take advantage of the Social Value Act, to work with local authorities in the co-production of new models of public service delivery

56. Building up our trading company ‘Conduit’ to create more jobs and considering audacious projects like an ‘Academy’

57. Growing our Great North Loan Fund concept to over £20million in funds under management