Plan Bee founder shortlisted for top UK green entrepreneur award

Lanarkshire-based eco-innovation business Plan Bee has been shortlisted as a finalist in the Entrepreneur of the Year Award at the Business Green Leaders Awards in London.

Now in their fifth year, the Business Green Leaders Awards celebrate the leading businesses, executives, entrepreneurs, investors, and campaigners from across the green economy.

The awards cover every aspect of the sector from transport to energy and from small businesses to multinationals, providing organisations of all sizes with the opportunity to highlight how they are contributing to the new green economy.

Plan Bee CEO Warren Bader said: “It’s great to have national recognition of our achievements”.

Fresh from being named the UK green economy’s Small Business of the Year last year, the ground-breaking eco-innovation business which offers managed bee-hive services, has created a buzz by pulling off one of Scotland’s most successful crowdfunding campaigns as part of a second funding round which also attracted backing from the public and private sectors.

Advised by law firm Harper Macleod, the start-up raised £105,500 from 177 investors on the Crowdcube platform, almost 176 per cent of its target of £60,000.

Added to further investment of £35,000 from Glasgow-based business syndicate Kelvin Capital - matched by the Scottish Investment Bank (SIB), the investment arm of Scottish Enterprise - it takes Plan Bee’s funding past £300,000 in total since last year.

This is the first time in Scotland that a business has utilised funding from crowd investors, angel syndicate and public sector investment making this a unique deal within itself.

The company has recently won a number of awards for its innovative creation of an Elderflower and Rose petal Mead, and is launching a further investment round through Kelvin Capital to develop both the mead and honey beer product lines under the ‘Beehive Brae’ brand name.