by Carla Gozo

Before Eventure became one of Graft’s highly trusted business partners, Charli Briggs and Melanie were just strangers on a train that had broken down in Kirkstall, Leeds. It was right around the spring of 2021 when Melanie’s luck seemed to run out on a day that she had no cash in her purse and her phone battery drained while she was trying to get home.

“I was frantic,” Melanie said, “I didn’t know what I was going to do until this wonderful person named Charli came up to me and asked, ‘Are you trying to get to Apperley Bridge?’” Little did they realise this interaction was only the beginning of what would soon prove to be a valuable relationship for them both.

As Charli recounted, “We were in the taxi and just started talking about what we do for work which was when we found that we have quite a lot in common in terms of both being in young businesses, we both have the same values, we had a lot of the same connections in our network.”

The conversation naturally led to a great sense of solidarity and an exchange of contact information, “It felt like it was meant to be, really, and after the stressful day that I had, this was a really nice way to finish it.”

It wasn’t long afterwards that Eventure started rapidly scaling up from humble beginnings when they’d done staffing events for local shopping centres to now working with big brands and getting ready to staff one of the biggest sporting events in the UK. Over the course of their expansion, Charli knew that she needed a recruiter who understood how to look beyond a job description and find people whose passions aligned with her company’s goals.

Charli was reluctant to work with a recruitment agency having never used one before, but after her serendipitous meeting with Melanie she thought it was at least worth reaching out. Surely enough, Graft’s commitment to genuine care for applicants and business leaders was just what Eventure needed. After successfully finding a Grafter with the right spirit and initiative to join Charli’s team, the two companies, and their founders, have had each other’s backs ever since.

Just as Charli and Melanie had done with each other, both women credit the success of their businesses to having a support system of friends, colleagues and advisors that have guided them along their journeys.

“I had a lot of doubt when I first started [Eventure] because I was worried about not knowing everything,” said Charli, “It was a lot of business things that I had no idea about but it is surprising, if you speak to people and grow your network, how willing people are to help you.”

Melanie added, “Although our industries are different, business is business, so there is a lot of synergy when we run into the same problems to work through and when you can have conversations about how others are running their own companies it’s a constant source of inspiration.”

The fast-paced work culture of our modern age sometimes has us forget that the root of any great business is human connection. When you filter out the salesmanship and agenda-setting, success comes when you remember to strengthen your relationships, focus on what you have in common with others and, most importantly, be kind. It just goes to show that whether you’re starting your career or in its well-advanced stages, nothing beats the power of constantly building a network of people you can count on. 

Eventure won the CN Agency Award for Start-up of the Year in 2021 and has been nominated again this year. The company also took the prize at The Yorkshire and The Humber FSB Celebrating Small Business Awards that took place last May.