ONE of Tavistock's fastest growing companies is celebrating ten years in business by taking a major step forward and branching out further afield. Hilary Broadley founded Broadley Speaking in 1997, working from her spare bedroom. The marketing company is now one of the UK's leading business to business sales agencies, numbering such big names as Manchester United sponsors AIG and Mitsubishi among its clients. The company, which now employs more than 30 people in Tavistock, has just opened its newest branch at Stamford in Lincolnshire. Hilary Broadley said: 'Basically I started ten years ago doing a bit of freelance stuff — I wanted to work around the children. 'I took on two other mums I met in the school playground who also wanted to work flexibly and we've grown entirely from that. 'From our start in West Devon, we have essentially built a national business. We already have customers as far north as Aberdeen who are delighted to be working with us here in Tavistock.' Hilary said her staff choose how many hours a week they work, and which days — the emphasis was on flexibility, provided targets were being met effectively. 'The onus is very much on a work/life balance and we find people come into work more motivated and focussed — we have a really fantastic team here, many of whom otherwise would not be working,' said Hilary. Broadley Speaking generates business leads and opportunities for its clients, which can then be followed up by the clients' own sales staff. Hilary's team make an average of 500 hours of calls per week on behalf of around 30 different companies. Hilary said she was delighted to be opening a new branch in the market town of Stamford, which will be managed by one of her former Tavistock employees, Isabel Robson. And she believes there is no reason why further expansion should not be in the pipeline for the Tavistock-based success story. 'We are actively looking for other locations right now — we are very ambitious to open more branches,' she said.
