Join New Wimbledon Theatre’s Pie Contest

 

To celebrate their re-opening and the opening gala performance: Waitress the Musical, New Wimbledon Theatre are challenging local businesses in Wimbledon Town Centre to a pie contest! Which business will reign supreme?

The musical comedy Waitress centre around protagonist, Jenna, who creates some wild and wonderful pie creations, such as Marshmallow Mermaid Pie, Pineapple Upside Down Pie and A Little Wild Wild Berry Pie.

Taking place on Thursday 2nd September on The Piazza (outside Morrison’s), the contest will allow you and your employees to put your baking skills to the test and come down to enjoy a slice of pie after the final judging!

The categories are as follows:

  • Best Looking Pie
  • Most Inventive Ingredients
  • Best Themed Pie
  • Best Specialty Pie (gluten/dairy free, vegan, etc.)
  • Best Sweet Pie
  • Best Savoury Pie
  • Winner of Overall.

Each business may enter as many times as they wish –  perhaps you have several pie-makers among your ranks, so there are no limits to anyone’s creativity! The winners of each category will receive a special gift and tickets to the show 4th – 11th September 2021.

Pies will need to be dropped off between 9-10am at New Wimbledon Theatre Stage Door (93 The Broadway SW19 1QG). If the number of entries surpasses 20, the first round of judging will be at 12pm followed by a final round at 2pm.

All pie’s will be eligible for the overall winner status, but you can select how many categories you believe your pie will fit into or you would like it to be eligible for.

For more details and to enter the competition, click here.

Is Your Business Struggling With Slow Broadband?

Wimbledon Town Centre does not currently have high speed broadband installed into the town and we know that many businesses are struggling individually. Slow speeds might be evident through your payment card machines, slow internet response, your online booking platform, your customer Wi-Fi provision and ultimately your employee/customer experience.

Love Wimbledon BID has been working with a leading industry supplier, Hyperoptic, to potentially bring their unstoppable broadband to all the businesses in town. However, to make this happen, we need your help to demonstrate the demand for increased broadband speeds for businesses in Wimbledon.

If we can gain support from enough businesses, this installation will be provided free of charge giving you access to ultrafast speeds and bringing Wimbledon Town Centre into the 21st century!

All you need to do is to register your interest, with no obligation, to be kept updated on the progress and take advantage of exclusive offers, such as your first 3 months totally free on selected packages, when it goes live.

By registering your interest at this stage, you are not committing to anything. An estimate of connection and ongoing charges, and speeds will be dependent on the package you take.

We are aware that some businesses in town do not control decisions to sign up to offers such as this, but we believe that both your staff and customers will benefit from this upgrade. So please ask your internal decision makers for permission to register at this stage.

For any questions, please contact Love Wimbledon’s Operations Manager, Kevin Gallagher.

Register here.

Women’s Night Safety Charter

Love Wimbledon has signed up to the Women’s Night Safety Charter, and we are encouraging all evening economy businesses in Wimbledon Town Centre to adopt the same approach, to help make London a city where all women feel confident and welcome at night.

The Mayor of London has created a charter to tackle this issue, at the request of Londoners to the Night Czar to prioritise women’s safety, so that women feel safe when travelling, working or going out at night.

The charter is part of the Mayor’s Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy and London’s commitment to the UN Women Safe Cities and Safe Public Spaces global initiative.

The Charter

Organisations that operate at night and support the charter, will sign-up to some simple pledges:

  • Nominate a champion in the organisation who actively promotes women’s night safety
  • Demonstrate to staff and customers that the organisation takes women’s safety at night seriously, for example through a communications campaign
  • Remind customers and staff that London is safe, but tell them what to do if they experience harassment when working, going out or travelling
  • Encourage reporting by victims and bystanders as part of your communications campaign
  • Train staff to ensure that all women who report are believed
  • Train staff to ensure that all reports are recorded and responded to
  • Design your public spaces and work places to make them safer for women at night

Businesses can sign up for the charter here.

Flowers Can Talk

 

Flowers Really Do Talk!

We all love a flower, especially in Wimbledon Town Centre, and increasing the amount of planting is a great way to bring in life, colour, nature and biodiversity. But what if there was something different to a flower bed? What if the plants could grow from a lamppost? And what if the plants could tell you when they needed watering?

Business Improvement District Love Wimbledon thought we would give it a go, after local urban greening company Scotscape contacted us about their new LivingPillar™.

A new vertical LivingPillar™ has been created in Wimbledon Town Centre, acting as a trial,  the first of its kind in South London. Packed with petunias, 84 of them and very much part of the Wimbledon Tennis Championships colour theme, the new Living Pillar™ has an irrigation system which runs on solar power using a high efficiency solar panel (at the top of the pillar) to recharge the systems battery source. Better still, it features a monitor which enables water management remotely via an App, whereby the plants are reporting when they are about to run out of water as the tank becomes empty. Scotscape monitors this and when the plants need some water and the reservoir needs topping up, it gets done! The technology ensures zero water is wasted, as any excess irrigation water is recycled.

Helen Clark Bell CEO of Love Wimbledon commented:

‘We initially set out to improve the neglected flower bed outside Evans Cycle so worked with Merton Council to get the wooden bench refurbished and the retaining wall repointed. Scotscape approached us and offered to overhaul the bed, providing new plants for the flowerbeds. We had heard of Scotscape’s innovative lamppost solution; this was the perfect place to trial a Living Pillar™ in Merton. Future planting will include air scrubbing plants helping to improve the air quality whilst also making the town greener.  Where space is limited, horizontal planting provides a very different opportunity and where tree planting is restricted, planted posts and pillars offer a  space-saving solution as well as a visual treat.’

   
 During installation of the pillar

Angus Cunningham, CEO of Scotscape added:

‘Scotscape and Love Wimbledon have aligned thoughts on improving places and spaces through planting, By introducing sustainable planting and biodiversity in tricky locations, the Living Pillar™ will do a little bit more to help with air quality and longer term the app should enable us to measure air quality in the area as well as keep our plants watered when they ask!’

   
The Evans flowerbed before and after refurbishment

Businesses are already talking about the improvements:

‘Many thanks to Love Wimbledon BID for transformation of a neglected flowerbed, into something sustainable, and great to look at.’

– Manager, Wibbas Down Inn

And that’s not all – bird, bee and insect boxes will be installed in the autumn, with the planting undergrowth acting as the perfect refuge for urban wildlife and insects. The Petunias will be replaced with plant species carefully selected for their seasonal pollen and nectar production, as well as their ability to remove polluting particulate matter from air.

The LivingPillar™ can  be found in front of Evans Cycles on Gladstone Road in Wimbledon Town Centre.