Two Cumbrian entrepreneurs have won prestigious awards at a North West event celebrating women’s success in business.
Amanda Wilson, of the Pie Mill, based at the Blencathra Business Centre in Threlkeld, near Keswick, and Zoe Wilson, of ZW Clinics in Kendal, won Enterprise Vision Awards at a ceremony in Blackpool’s iconic Empress Ballroom.
The ethos behind the awards is to promote female entrepreneurship and to shine the spotlight on the region’s role models to inspire more women to feel empowered and to aim higher.
Amanda Wilson won the Hospitality Industry Award and there were tears in the audience as she paid tribute to her beloved late father Jim Hodge and his special recipes for their award-winning pies. She dedicated the award to him.
Jim died in 2020 due to coronavirus.
Amanda said: “The Pie Mill was always dad’s dream. My parents used to have the Mill Inn at Mungrisdale and dad was the chef. I grew up with delicious home-made casseroles and fish dishes. Dad was always the chef at home, not mum.”
The inspiration for The Pie Mill came from another time of hardship when Amanda’s family had to pull together. “We started making pies when foot and mouth hit in 2001. It was quiet at the Mill Inn, so we made pies for charities helping those affected by the disease. The Pie Mill came from people asking to take the pies home and we started offering deliveries,” said Amanda.
Together with a tight-knit team including her mum, Margaret, Amanda now makes more than 40 different types of savoury and fruit pie, plus quiches and pasties. They can roll, fill and bake up to 4,000 pies a week in peak season – but they’ll never agree on who can crimp fastest.
Amanda is a champion of Cumbrian produce who embraces opportunities to support other local businesses.
Amanda and the Pie Mill feature in A Lake District Farm Shop earlier this year, the runaway Channel 4 success about life at Tebay Services.
Zoe Wilson, of ZW Clinics in Kendal, won the Health and Wellbeing Award. The judges said that “Zoe demonstrated in depth industry knowledge and research and successfully applied this into her marketing strategy. Her collaborative approach with competitors to put her clients’ needs first has her customers running back for more.”
Coral Horn, founder of the EVAS and Pink Link, said: “All our finalists should be hugely proud of their achievements, the competition was intense and highly contested. Well done to the winners who stepped up and went the extra mile.” She closed with the exciting announcement that next year, an expo for women in business will be held the day before the awards bringing an additional boost for female driven business in the region.
