Setting new boundaries for female funding

Bess Heath has been living the cricketing dream this summer.

The England wicketkeeper/batter has been centre stage since signing up for Durham Women’s first season as a professional outfit.

Bess and her team-mates should finish above mid-table in the ECB’s Tier 1 eight-team league, which was established for an initial three seasons earlier this year.

She was also part of The Hundred-winning Northern Superchargers team that beat London

Spirit in the 100-ball-a-side competition’s showpiece final.

Durham’s T20 performances could have been better, she admits, after they missed out on silverware, but the team has improved as the summer has progressed.

They have set the foundations for next season and campaigns to come.

“We’ve gelled really well as a team, and it’s starting to become like a family,” says Bess, who has three older brothers.

She adds: “I think it’s important that shows on the cricket pitch, and that you have a kind of sisterhood out there.

“We got off to a slow start, but after the mid- season break, we got on a bit of a winning run and put in some good performances.

“Being such a big change for a lot of people, I think we’ve done well, and there are some definite positives to take throughout the summer, as well as some learnings to take into the winter.

“Hopefully, we’ll come back firing next summer.

“It’s fulfilled what we wanted in a lot of ways, but we want to keep progressing, keep pushing ourselves and keep those professional standards rising.

“I don’t think we ever really want to settle.”

It isn’t just the performances on the Banks Homes Riverside square that have been important this year for Bess and the rest of the Durham Women squad, though.

They know they are trailblazers as Durham’s first full-time female players, and with that comes the responsibility of spreading the message from their Chester-le-Street base across the North East.

Bess, who originates from Derbyshire, says the squad embraced that role from the moment they took the field for the first time in May – when they beat Essex by six wickets – to their first home game against Lancashire a month later, which attracted hundreds of first-time fans.

Bess even met a young fan with the same name.

She says: “She was at one of the games and said, ‘I’ve never met a Bess before, can you sign my number six, please?’

“And I said, ‘I don’t think I’ve ever met a Bess before either – of course I’ll sign it’.

“It’s little moments like that that really have an impact.”

And it won’t stop there, with Durham Women Football Club also planning to become part of the sporting revolution at the Riverside when they move from their current Durham University ground to a new custom-built stadium and training centre.

Bess says: “When we had that first game here, the crowd that came down and the support we got felt very cool.

“And we just want more of it – more girls, clubs and schools coming down to show what we can put on here.

“I think we have a massive opportunity to bring cricket back here with a bit of force and passion.

“With the plans that are afoot, this could be amazing.

“And if you’re one of the original people to be a part of that, I think that’s quite a unique opportunity.

“It is so exciting to be a part of it, to be part of the change and the movement towards more sport, more passion and a strong bond across the North East.

“For me, it’s exciting to be at the start of it and see it all happen, and be a part of the change.

“I love change.

“If it’s already built and already there, you become one of the many to experience something, but we have an opportunity to start something, build on it, help out and create more of a community.

“I’m all for it.”

Fitting then that Bess is one of the players now sponsored by Maven Capital Partners, a UK-wide investor with North East offices in Newcastle, Durham and Middlesbrough.

Maven, which sponsored the team’s training top last year, is one of the country’s leading private equity and venture capital firms, investing from various funds under management including the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund II – NE Equity Fund, managed on behalf of British Business Bank, and the Finance Durham Fund, which is managed on behalf of Durham County Council by Business Durham.

Various other funds provide capital to unlock business growth, including Maven’s Venture Capital Trusts.

In addition to supporting businesses on their growth journeys, Maven launched the Female Founder Funding Programme from the North East, aimed at offering valuable resources, mentorship and collaboration opportunities for female entrepreneurs wanting to find out more about raising investment.

The programme’s purpose is to empower women to explore how investment can help scale their businesses while demystifying some of the myths around raising investment.

For Maven investment manager Rebecca Minchella, like England’s Euro 2025 champions in football, Bess represents the kind of women who can succeed in sport and inspire in business.

Rebecca, pictured below with Bess, says: “Sport is a huge part of my life.

“At Maven, we’re very much behind all of the positive things that female sport represents, and we try and take some of the impact of that into the world of business.

“I’m really passionate about the impact of sport, particularly on young women but females in general, and all of those skills that you develop that translate in business and in positions of leadership.

“A lot of the work we do is supporting female entrepreneurs to start, build and scale their business with funding in the future, so there are a lot of alignments with Durham Women Cricket: ambitious, a great set-up and pushing for growth.

“If you can’t see it, you can’t be it – and it’s the same here.

“I know, because I’m fortunate to see it every day, that in business, there are a lot of successful female entrepreneurs in the North East.

“But we don’t often talk about how good we are.

“It’s all about creating case studies, and there are so many things you can take away from sport that translate into business – confidence, resilience, leadership, grit, determination.

“One of the best parts of my job is meeting inspiring entrepreneurs every day, finding out more about their ambitions and unpicking and demystifying funding, and making it more of a tangible process that women feel they can go through.

“It is all about opening doors.

“The goal for us is to invest in more female-led businesses, and that’s something we are doing.”

England development contract player Bess has her own long-term business aspirations, as Rebecca discovers when the pair meet ahead of our interview in one of the Banks Homes Riverside boxes.

Bess helped out with her family’s tree surgery business from a young age – and knows how to handle a chainsaw – and would like to open her own coffee shop after retirement.

Aged 23, with five England appearances to her name so far across all formats, stints in Australia and with The Hundred’s Northern Superchargers, that will be some time off.

But with the likes of Maven behind her – and businesswomen across the North East – she will not be short of support, both on and off the pitch.

Bess adds: “I can imagine there are similarities with a successful cricket team and success in the business world, because you’ve got a team you want to work to the best of its ability for that one goal.

“It’s how you keep them working towards that and keep the passion.

“And you’ve got to have discipline and motivation to succeed.”

For more information about Maven and its portfolio of business support, including the Female Founder Funding Programme, visit www.mavencp.com

LinkedIn: Maven Capital Partners

 

Photography by Andrew Lowe