When North East chef and social entrepreneur, Mark Earnden, needed to create a website for his Community Interest Company, he turned to the North East Regional Portal (TNERP) for help.

Mark runs EXPO Chef, which is a regional road show where he demonstrates that healthy eating and cooking can be easy, fun and affordable.

As a Community Interest Company, the main ambition is to turn cooking into educational entertainment.

Mark wanted to support EXPO Chefs road shows by providing information and downloads about healthy eating and cooking online.

“EXPO Chef is all about helping people in the region discover easy ways to prepare healthy and tasty food,” explained Mark, “I try and show that food is fun and can be affordable when you know what to cook and how to cook it. The road shows include food tasting, spice testing, games and competitions.

“People at the road shows are keen to learn more, and I soon realised that I needed a way to provide information and advice on a continual basis.

A website offered the perfect way to do this, as well as a way for people to contact me for suggestions and advice.”

“However, it was vital that the website is easy to maintain with minimum fuss and training.

It was also important that the website offered good value for money.

“The Regional Portal set up an eight-page brochure-style website, the website address and webmail accounts quickly and all for under £500.

"They also provided photography, copywriting services, planned the website structure and trained me on how to update the website.

“Now I can add content to the website in minutes and ensure that I provide a wealth of useful and practical information as downloads on the website.”

Through the website online users can download a wide range of healthy food information, such as recipes and menus, to help them adopt a healthier lifestyle.

Users also have the opportunity to ask Mark for advice and suggestions on cooking healthy food.

Portal chief executive, Norma Foster, says: “Mark needed a way to provide information that is regularly requested about healthy eating, and a website is an excellent way to achieve this.

"By using award-winning software 1&1 WebsiteBuilder, we can set up a professional website quickly and cost-effectively.

"The website can then be managed without the need for specialist IT skills.”

Relevant links

The Regional Portal

Expo Chef

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