We win Business of the Year at Welsh awards ceremony

We have been crowned Business of the Year at the Arts and Business Cymru Awards, which took place at Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff.

Picture caption: Welsh actor Mark Lewis Jones presented the Arts and Business Cymru Business of the Year Award to WPD’s Karen Welch who managed the projects.

The awards are designed to encourage, acknowledge, recognise and reward innovative partnerships between the private sector and the arts which benefit Welsh communities.

We have been praised as an outstanding winner for our wide range of arts partnerships that clearly communicate our business ethos, according to the independent judging panel.

They praised the ‘generosity of approach’ demonstrated in sponsoring different art forms and organisations, both large and small, and also felt our focus was distinct – with a clear commitment to the community we serve and the most vulnerable members of society within it.

They agreed that the many of our partnerships stood as a real role model of excellence in the field.

We also won the Brand Identity Award which recognised partnerships that demonstrated maximum impact on a business brand – in particular was our focus on connecting with older people, many of whom are living with dementia, and our work in raising awareness of our Priority Services Register.

Click here to watch a summary of our partnerships on YouTube. 

Arts organisations we have worked with include:

• National Dance Company Wales for its Dance for Parkinson’s workshops.
• Music in Hospitals & Care Cymru for their performances in Day centres.
• The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama’s dementia-friendly concerts and BSL-interpreted theatre shows.
• The Gate Arts Centre’s for its Brew community programme.
• The National Museum of Wales’ Big Pit intergenerational project tackling social isolation.
• Newport’s Big Splash festival.
• The Pembrokeshire based Engage Cymru dementia friendly art galleries.
• Carmarthen Youth Opera and Urdd Gobaith Cymru for nurturing the talents of young people