Young designers are setting the standard

top trio . . . David with colleagues Nicola and Sarah

A FLEDGLING business staffed by three bright young things from Oldham is bucking the national trend and increasing its turnover by 50 per cent year-on-year, it was revealed.

Cornerstone Design and Marketing Ltd is a full service design and digital agency, mirroring the modern age, offering a range of creatives to a growing pool of clients.

Set up by David Wadsworth (26), from Lees, the agency has relocated to quirky yet somehow wholly appropriate premises in the Woodend Mill Business Centre, off Co-operative Street, Lees.

A former Huddersfield University student — he gained a first-class degree in marketing — David learned his trade before before deciding to go it alone.

“I was an account manager at my last place and I just didn’t like the way they were doing business,” he said.

“I wanted to be open with clients and do things a different way, so I set up on my own.”

That meant working from home for a while and with the support and professional help of his fiancee Sarah Smethurst, a graphic designer, the pair grew the business to a point where had taken on part-time help.

“It was time to move on,” added David and Sarah, so they secured the space at Woodend, completed the refurbishment themselves and converted designer Nicola Hill, from Austerlands, to a full-time role.

They work for a range of clients across Greater Manchester including the region’s Ambulance Service, for whom they completed a rebranding exercise, plus other public bodies including Oldham Council, Oldham Community Leisure, Saddleworth Parish Council and ongoing commissions for Cancer Research UK.

“Most of our work comes from recommendations. We have a steady stream of inquiries and we are proud to be one of only 3,300 agencies in the country to be affiliated to the Recommended Agency Register which requires consistently high customer satisfaction ratings,” said David.