Three Bristol directors have been recognised as among the best in the South West at the prestigious Institute of Directors’ annual regional awards.
Nick Sturge, co-founder of enterprise hub The Engine Shed at Temple Meads, which houses the SETsquared innovation centre, won the Public Sector Director title. Julia Clarke, chief executive of Bristol Community Health, was highly commended in this category.
Henry Williams, managing director of Morgan and Lotus car dealer Williams Automobiles in Chipping Sodbury, was named Family Business Director while Steve Clark, chairman of Almondsbury-based Budget Pack Environmental won the Corporate Responsibility Award. 
Griff Holland and Ed Brown, founders of Bristol-based healthy fast food restaurant chain Friska Food, were highly commended in the Corporate Responsibility category. They were also shortlisted for the Young Director title.
The awards, which celebrate excellence in the boardroom, took place at Paintworks and were supported by Bristol Business News and its sister websites Bath Business News and Swindon Business News as media partners.
Winners go forward for a chance to be a national award winner, judged against all the other regional finalists.
For Nick Sturge, the award capped a busy week during which he has attended a technology sector reception at Buckingham Palace with several members of the royal family and visited 10 Downing Street for a meeting with the Prime Minister.
Nick is director of the Science Research Foundation, owned by the University of Bristol and the organisation behind both the Engine Shed enterprise hub at Temple Meads and the highly-successful business incubator SETsquared. Between them they support more than 60 hi-tech, high-growth businesses.
Henry Williams has reversed the fortunes of his 103-year-old family motor firm from ceasing to trade to a highly-profitable, globally-recognised niche business. His vision was to become a national ‘destination’ dealership rather than just a local franchised operation.
As Morgan’s largest UK dealer, he also wanted to build the UK’s most environmentally-friendly car retail business with the best online service. He now employs 11 people and the company recently gained the title Green Operation of the Year from a major motor trade organisation in recognition of its commitment to the environment.
Steve Clark, Budget Pack Environmental’s chairman, set up the business in 2003 when he failed to find a flexible, customer-focused compliance scheme to represent his customers’ best interests for recycling under UK packaging regulations.
The company is now one of the UK’s fastest-growing compliance schemes with 700-plus members across packaging, electric and electronic equipment recycling and batteries compliance. It provides waste collection and recycling services at more than 6,000 locations and advises on UK recycling policy.
Griff and Ed opened their first Friska branch in Victoria Street in 2009 and now operate from four sites around Bristol employing more than 40 people and focused on serving fresh, interesting, responsibly-sourced food in a friendly and hospitable environment, both sit down and take away.
The duo are set to scale up Friska across the UK with an expansion plan for a further 16 sites starting with Birmingham later this year.
They work with the charities FareShare, which recycles unsold food, and Bristol-based Deki, which provides microloans to businesses in developing countries.
Shortlisted in the Family Business category was Neil Way, who runs Knowle-based Jeff Way Electrical Services.
He joined the business from the RAF in 2007 and has overseen year-on-year growth in the electrical installation and maintenance company, particularly in the new-build and social housing market. Jeff has recently created more than 100 jobs and employed and trained almost 50 apprentices.
Also speaking at last night’s event were IoD chief economist James Sproule and John Rubidge of UKTI.
