A Message from the Creative Spark Team 

Cruinniú na nÓg 2020

Creative Spark is delighted to announce its involvement in Cruinniú na nÓg 2020! Local artist Caoimhe MCarthy is going to illustrate a ‘big picture’ of her interpretation of Louth. Representing the county with folklore stories about the region. This will be a large illustration celebrating County Louth. She will be interviewed about her process and talk about the story/stories she is illustrating. The image will be divided up into  pieces. These pieces will be numbered and scaled to print on a standard a4 page. These can be printed at home by participants. These can be scanned or photographed and uploaded to us or tagged on social media. Our team can then reassemble all the entries. A community Jigsaw. Images will be available to download at creativespark.ie

National Association of Community Enterprise Centres

A business barometer survey of enterprise centres by the National Association of Community Enterprise Centres (NACEC), which promotes, supports and develops the community and regional enterprise sector, found 33pc of them had tenants which had shut down permanently. NACEC has calculated a recovery plan would require €5m investment in the sector to help enterprise centres and co-working hubs to adapt their facilities and services, particularly to social-distancing requirements. NACEC is seeking investment from Government and further discussions with the Department of Business, Enterprise and Innovation will take place this week. Business Minister Heather Humphreys has given her backing to the plan, which would bring new business to more than 200 State-backed enterprise hubs throughout the country.

Humphreys said that her department "has awarded considerable funding to support the development of a national network of enterprise, technology and co-working hubs throughout Ireland and I believe NACEC and the wider enterprise hub network is well placed to support our multinationals, large corporates and SMEs with their remote and flexible working requirements after the pandemic".

Enterprise centres could open their doors to remote workers from multinational firms to give them access to key facilities.

"There are potentially 10,000 spaces available in the nation's enterprise centres and remote-working hubs," said Gary O'Meara, chairman NACEC, which is leading the plan. "Many people are now finding that working at home comes with big limitations so this could be a very welcome opportunity for many companies and their workers. It's a win-win for everyone." O'Meara said the plan had the potential to provide long-term solutions beyond the pandemic and could be a boost for local communities.

John O'Dea, chief executive of Tech Ireland, which represents many large multinational employers, expressed support for the emerging plan. "Enabling people to work closer to where they live can have positive and long-term sustainable benefits for the environment, rural regeneration and the health and well-being of our employees, so utilising the national enterprise hub infrastructure to support the future of flexible working is an exciting project that we are delighted to be supporting," he said.

Creative Spark provides co-working and own door office space in Dundalk. For more information click here

• Direct grant aid of between €2,000 minimum and €10,000 based on commercial rate bill for 2019
• Scheme applies to small businesses with a turnover of under €5m and employing 50 people or less
• The business must have suffered a projected 25%+ loss in revenue from 1st April 2020 to 30th June 2020
• The closing date for receipt of applications is 31st August