Aberystwyth University’s business department wants to fight against the closure of businesses in Llanidloes by offering workshops and strategic help.

Julie Jones, a marketing lecturer, wants to use her knowledge to help the town’s businesses not only survive the cost of living crisis, but to thrive and build up a ‘town brand’.

Although no date has been set so far, Ms Jones hopes the workshops will happen in the second or third week of January.

Ms Jones said: “One of my focuses is to work with external businesses in the area. One of my PhD students has been looking at town regeneration in north Wales, and I will be using some of that in my workshops down here.

“Small businesses do things because they love what they do, they’re not always aware of the things that encompass this, like marketing and so on. I hope these workshops will help them become more business oriented.

“We know Aber and Llanidloes are dependent on tourists, but what do we know about those tourists? It’s having this knowledge that helps us make changes to our business; they may only be tiny changes, but they can make a big difference.”

Ms Jones began offering similar workshops for business owners in Aberystwyth in December, run by herself and members of Antur Cymru, who Ms Jones hopes will participate in the workshops in Llanidloes.

Ms Jones said the 30 people who showed up were surprised by the approach she took to looking at business: “It made them think that they need to take a step back and look at their business, instead of getting entangled in the daily groove of running a business.”

Anyone with an interest in attending these workshops can contact Ms Jones through her email at [email protected].

Ms Jones also said there will be updates posted on the Llanidloes community notice board Facebook page.