On Wednesday 14 October, Magna Science Adventure Centre in Rotherham hosted the unLTD Business Expo. Tucked inside it was Fresh Meet CIC's second Innovation Lab.
Over 80 young people from five South Yorkshire schools and training providers spent the day working on four live Challenge Briefs. Fourteen industry Mentors stayed with them from start to finish, and the four Brief Holders were there in person to hand over their problems and hear the pitches.
Three months ago, our first Lab at Discovery by Scrannery had 70 young people and six briefs. This one was bigger, busier, and sat in the middle of a working business Expo. That was the point.
How we ended up at Magna
Phil Turner, MD of unLTD, mentored a team at our first Lab in July. Within a week, he'd asked us to bring the Lab to his Expo.
Phil wanted it in the thick of things, not hived off in a side room. So the young people weren't just solving business problems; they were surrounded by hundreds of actual businesses, and several teams used the Expo floor for live research.
How the day worked
We changed the format from Lab 1, based on what you told us last time.
- One team, one brief, one Mentor, all day. Teams of around seven, mixed across schools where we could. No rotating between briefs.
- A structured team workbook. Eleven sheets taking each team from understanding the problem, through questioning their Brief Holder and doing quick research, to shaping and pitching an idea.
- Mentor packs. Every Mentor had a pack in advance explaining their role on the day.
- Two presentation tracks. Teams pitched back to their Brief Holder at 1:30pm, split across two rooms so nobody had to sit through eleven pitches.
- Then the Expo. Once the pitching was done, teams went off to explore the Expo with their Mentors.
There was also a Halloween side quest: film stills popping up through the day, with the titles disguised as vowel-free clues. Every sheet handed in went into a prize draw for Sheffield City Centre Gift Cards.
Four real problems
As always, nothing was made up. Four organisations trusted us with genuine, unsolved problems.
Sumo Digital. Sheffield's own games studio asked how games stay exciting and relevant when they're competing with TikTok, YouTube and streaming for every spare minute. Brief Holder: Chris Ravenscroft, Lead Programmer.
South Yorkshire Innovation Programme. SYIP, delivered through Sheffield Hallam University, asked how small businesses can find the right support at the right time, without giving up along the way. Brief Holder: Felix Barr, Specialist Innovation Adviser. Felix was a Mentor at Lab 1, so it was great to have him back on the other side of the table.
Roundabout. The Sheffield charity supporting young people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness asked how to build a volunteer programme that matches people to useful tasks. That included a dedicated team to get empty homes painted and ready faster, so young people can move in sooner. Brief Holder: Imogen Murphy, Community Fundraiser.
Sheffield BID. The Sheffield City Centre Gift Card turns ten next year. Richard Pilgrim, Project Manager at Sheffield BID, asked how to get more people choosing the digital card (Apple Pay and Google Wallet) over the plastic one.
What the teams came up with
Eleven teams, eleven pitches. Every Brief Holder is getting a full report on every team that worked on their brief, so here's just a taste.
The pattern I loved most: the best teams let what they heard change their minds.
Games that keep you coming back. One Sumo Digital team started from the idea that social media was killing games. Then the people they interviewed told them they actually preferred gaming to scrolling; what held them back was time, cost and availability. So the team pivoted to regular, themed updates, "not too often, not too rare", shaped by the player community. Another team flipped the problem completely: instead of competing with YouTube, get free demos into the hands of creators early and make YouTube the way players find the game.
Support that goes to people. The SYIP teams kept landing on the same truth: small business owners have no time. One team's test for everything was "within three clicks". Another looked at the problem from both sides and noticed that support providers can spend more time telling people help exists than actually helping. Their line stuck with me:
"You can't expect SMEs to meet you where you are - you need to go to them."
From recruitment to retention. All three Roundabout teams started out thinking the problem was getting more volunteers. Then Imogen told them, "It's not about how many, it's about retaining." All three changed course. One team surveyed six people: all six said seeing the impact of their work would keep them coming back, and only one said prizes would. Another team met an employer engagement adviser from The Sheffield College on the Expo floor, and built an idea around college learners who need work experience volunteering on property maintenance.
Digitise and incentivise. A Sheffield BID team learned in their Q&A that business buyers are a small but growing slice of Gift Card sales. They went after them: incentives for corporate buyers, plus a QR code by email that takes you straight to the digital card. Another team proposed pop-up stalls where someone installs the digital card on your phone for you, plus a run of offers for the card's tenth birthday.
How it landed
The Brief Holders got what they came for: ideas that didn't look like their own.
"The answers that the groups gave were certainly insightful and different from the usual conclusions and assumptions we make." - Brief Holder
"It was a great opportunity to hear fresh ideas which approach a real-life problem we have within our charity." - Brief Holder
One Brief Holder told a few of the young people they probably wouldn't do university again, and plenty of them were surprised. That's exactly the kind of conversation we want these days to spark: there's more than one route into a good career.
The Mentors were the backbone of the day, and the settings noticed.
"Our mentors from Insight were outstanding. They put the students at ease, were just the right level of help and push, were full of ideas and made the day comfortable for our SEND learners." - Sheaf Training
One Mentor summed up the day in a sentence: seeing the learners come to life and grow as it went on. And one learner said they loved how educational it was, and that they'd made some new friends along the way.
What the numbers say
We ran short feedback surveys for learners and adults on the day.
- 26 of 29 learners said they'd learned something new.
- 27 of 29 said they now have a better idea of what the world of work involves.
- 25 of 29 would recommend Innovation Labs to someone else. Nobody said no.
- All 17 adults who responded (Mentors, Brief Holders, setting staff and guests) would recommend it.
What we'll change
Not everything went to plan, and the feedback said so. Good. That's what it's for.
The day was tight on time. An unplanned venue evacuation didn't help, and teams moved through the workbook at very different speeds, so some rushed the later stages. Several people said the room was noisy, and a couple of Mentors felt they weren't fully on top of their brief from the start.
One Brief Holder also noticed that in mixed groups, the girls sometimes contributed less than the boys. We're taking that seriously.
For the next Lab, we're planning to:
- Brief each Challenge once, to all its teams together, at the start, and have Brief Holders meet the Mentors beforehand.
- Get briefs to Mentors and settings earlier, so everyone arrives on top of the problem.
- Trim the workbook and add clearer time checks, so teams spend more time on ideas and less on filling in boxes.
- Find more breakout space, so every voice in a team can be heard.
- Tell settings their tables and Mentors in advance, and start each team in the room it'll present in.
Thank you
It takes a village. A huge thank you from Jilly and me to everyone who gave their time, their problems and their trust.
Our host and media partner: unLTD Business - Phil Turner
Our Venue Sponsor: Magna Science Adventure Centre - Hannah Martin, Becky Gill and Richard Hammill, who gave us the space and kit free of charge
The organisations who trusted us with live Challenge Briefs
- Roundabout - Imogen Murphy
- Sheffield BID - Richard Pilgrim
- South Yorkshire Innovation Programme (Sheffield Hallam University) - Felix Barr
- Sumo Digital - Chris Ravenscroft
Our five education and training settings, and their brilliant learners
- Barnsley Academy
- Kirk Balk Academy
- Oasis Academy Don Valley
- Sheaf Training
- UTC Sheffield Olympic Legacy Park
Our industry Mentors, who stayed with their teams all day
- Adrian Hattersley, AtkinsRéalis
- Alicia Carrion Plaza, Northern User Experience
- Brogan Froggat, Health Innovation Yorkshire & Humber
- Christina Lovelock, author of Careers in Tech, Data and Digital: From Education to Employment
- Dave King, Differentis
- Jack Kershaw, Kershaw Consulting
- Jessica Zeun, Zeun Consulting
- Judith Sewell, HDM Energy
- Kim Frost, Health Innovation Yorkshire & Humber
- Matt Pierre, Sheffield Wednesday FC Community Programme
- Megan Simpson, Esh Group
- Nicola Brown, Insight
- Stacey Jubb, Tate Professional
- Stephen Abbs, Insight
Our facilitators
- Steph Ashmore, Behind the Build, who also coordinated our Mentors
- Shannon Farrell, NHS England - North East and Yorkshire
Arigatou, Asante, Dhanvaad, Dziękuję, Obrigado, Shukran, Shukriya. However you say it, thank you.
What's next
Two Labs down. Four more are lined up across South Yorkshire.
- Barnsley, first half of Spring Term 2027. A Tech Town and community-themed Lab, with briefs from health, education, local business, sport and the voluntary sector.
- Sheffield Town Hall, April 2027. A Defence & Security Innovation Lab, with veterans and sector professionals as Mentors.
- Rotherham, Summer Term 2027. A health and social care Lab built around NHS "Analogue to Digital", co-designed with NHS England North East and Yorkshire.
- Back to the unLTD Business Expo at Magna, Wednesday 13 October 2027. Likely theme: clean power and CleanTech.
Want to get involved?
Settings are queuing up. What we need now is organisations to back the Labs.
If your organisation has social value commitments, or you're bidding for public contracts that ask for them, a Lab is a ready-made way to deliver them. It's real, it's local, and it comes with the evidence: everyone who takes part gets a tailored report afterwards, ready for bids, ESG reporting or board papers. And because Fresh Meet is a CIC, the money goes back into the work.
There are four ways in: sponsor a Lab, bring us a problem as a Challenge Brief, give a day as a Mentor, or come and see one for yourself. Drop me a line, yeah?
