'What Being Part of If we can, you can has meant to me', by Christine Pearce, 2009 Challenge Ambassador

This last year and being involved in the If We Can You Can Challenge has had an extremely positive affect on Restoration & Beyond. The publicity gained through the Hartlepool Mail has been invaluable and really helped our business to become known and even finding a new supplier.

When we entered, we had no idea just how much being linked to the Entrepreneurs Forum would help us to grow and become established.

When we were first short-listed we were invited to be questioned by a 'Dragon's Den' style panel consisting of local successful entrepreneurs, last year's finalists and representatives from ONE (One North East) and NECC (North East Chamber of Commerce).

At first it seemed a little daunting, but we soon got in to our flow and not only enjoyed the experience, but took a lot away from it too. It gave us the opportunity to have our business idea scrutinised by very experienced people in business and also to confirm to us that the concept and plan did stand up to scrutiny and was definitely worth pursuing. The unexpected outcome was that one of the judges, eventually became our mentor and investor as he was so convinced by us and our business.

Setting up in business is like a roller-coaster ride, but having the 'If We Can You Can' team and Entrepreneurs Forum behind us offering support, mentoring, introductions and much more, has really helped us to reach the summits. All of the other finalists have become friends too and we all support each other.

We like to express our thanks and appreciation for this to the whole team. We were delighted to attend the Entrepreneurs Forum Annual Conference last year which was a fantastic and inspirational experience and we hope to attend it again this year.

I would like to say to anybody who is either thinking of starting a business, or who is already up and running, to seriously consider entering this year on the 8th March. Why struggle alone when you can have all of the help, support and experience of seasoned entrepreneurs at your fingertips.

Our business emerged from the recession and redundancy. We hope we can show others that it is possible to turn your life and fortunes around by staying positive and turning problems into opportunities. After all, If we can, you certainly can!