the work village

John Buddle Work Village was launched in April 2004.

Purpose-built as a business centre offering office and workshop space, we have successfully supported and worked with 46 businesses, in fact around 60% of our tenants started up their business with a space at the Work Village, with many expanding within the 1st year of moving in. We pride ourselves on our excellence in customer service and have high standards in everything we do, and most importantly we are here to work with our tenants to assist wherever possible.

Here at the Work Village, we have 21 office suites and 3 workshop units. The spaces are designed to be flexible and we have a variety of sizes of offices, all of which are accessible all year round so you can work at the times you need to suit your business.

We’re in a great location - just 2 minutes’ drive from Newcastle City Centre or to the A1 and we have plenty of free car parking space and space for cycles too.

All our offices and workshops are connected to our broadband and telecoms networks allowing us to manage internet and phone services at affordable rates and no need to have to negotiate or sign up to lengthy contracts with minimum terms.

John Buddle Work Village offers a whole host of services from offices, workshops, conference space and virtual packages to support businesses that are not ready for premises but would benefit from access to the services we can provide.

Who runs John Buddle Work Village?

Alexandra Johnson manages John Buddle Work Village and Buddle House located at Buddle Road in Newcastle upon Tyne. The buildings are managed on behalf of registered charity RHWE Ltd - Reviving the Heart of the West End.

“Our mission is to support and encourage the economic and physical regeneration of the west end of Newcastle upon Tyne. We do this through the creation and development of enterprise, education and training initiatives for our local community.”

Don't just take our word for it... Click here to read testimonials from some of the tenants who started their business with us. Many have expanded, developed and moved into larger space, in some cases they have gone on to purchase their own premises.

Our charitable work is complemented by our Business Centres and enables us to fund a variety of projects that many of our tenants past and present support us with.

Many of our former tenants are part of our Business Ambassadors Club and offer support and resources to help us continue offering a wide range of experiences to support our businesses and also our community activities including:

Business Sparks This is our enterprise programme supporting 16-24 year olds with a business idea or the ambition to work for themselves. This is free and offers: 1-2-1 business advice, business planning workshops, a business start-up grant, mentoring support from our network of business contacts, and event opportunities for each ‘Business Spark’ to showcase their business ideas.

RHWE Scholarship Our Scholarship fund supports local people who are seeking a place on a higher education course. It recognises the need for additional financial support that is required during a student’s time at University or College. Four students were granted an RHWE scholarship in 2011 and will be supported on their 3 year degree programmes with a grant of £1,000 per year. Applications are being considered for the 2012 intake.

Community Grants Fund We have managed our own Community Grants Fund for 2 years now. Each year, we offer grants of up to £1,000 for local groups and organisations to apply to for financial support. We particularly encourage applications for training, education and enterprise projects.

Working World We regularly host students on work experience and we are developing our own ideas around providing good quality work placements for young people. Our Working World programme is designed to encourage the offer of work placements with assistance given to businesses to plan a productive and positive placement for both the student and the business. We are working closely with our tenants to develop this within the Work Village.

Please do contact us if you have any queries or would like to discuss any area of work relating to John Buddle Work Village or RHWE Ltd, we’d be delighted to hear from you.