Meet The Vibrancy Hub’s Laura Bamber and Katy Brown: firm friends and personal trainers for your wellbeing

Great British Life: The Vibrancy Hub offer a host of workshopsThe Vibrancy Hub offer a host of workshops (Image: KSP 2017)

In their late 20s and early 30s, Laura Bamber and Katy Brown were leading lives akin to those of many of their generation, ‘pounding the corporate ladder’ and living life to the full away from work. They were, in Katy’s words, ‘essentially living up to what society told [them] success and happiness looked like’. But there was a problem: for them, it didn’t feel like thriving.

‘I think I can speak for both of us when I say that we definitely felt, at different times, quite unfulfilled, not as happy as we wanted to be, definitely exhausted and definitely stressed,’ Katy recalls. ‘We were probably neglecting our own mental health and happiness to a certain extent,’ Laura adds.

The pair realised this, and both began proactively investing in their own personal development, learning about changes that enabled them to feel less stressed and anxious, as well as happier and more fulfilled. The move drove them towards establishing The Vibrancy Hub, an organisation the friends co-founded ‘to create a place where people could come to nurture their mental and emotional health and feel their most vibrant selves’.

Looking at its offering, the Hub feels like a one-stop-shop for wellbeing and happiness. A key string to its bow is the work that ex-marketeer Katy and former accountant Laura undertake with businesses to create more vibrant cultures, looking at the wellbeing of their staff and how they can optimise it. One-to-one personal coaching and mentoring are also offered by the company, with the pair giving clients advice and resources to allow them to feel their best and create the lives they desire. Additionally, the women run online programmes and events in the Cheshire and Manchester area – which they say will support participants to connect with themselves, strengthen their mindsets and nurture their bodies – and offer online resources. Lloyds Bank, AutoTrader, JD Sports and Asics are just some of the brands the duo have worked with.

Great British Life: Workshops are geared towards making people happier and calmerWorkshops are geared towards making people happier and calmer (Image: Archant)

‘We’re both passionate about helping people to really understand themselves, understand what’s important to them, and then encouraging them to let go of any external expectations and really own their own confidence and power – and who they are as a person,’ says Laura.

The Vibrancy Hub is underpinned by a friendship nurtured by a joint interest in self-development, wellbeing and mindfulness. Fourteen years ago, Katy met Laura’s sister through a graduate role, meeting Laura through her. The future business partners’ lives took them in different directions, but when Laura returned from a stint in Australia in 2015, the pair began spending time together. ‘We quickly discovered we had this massive shared interest,’ Katy recalls, adding: ‘I’d certainly never met anyone else that was as interested, enthusiastic and passionate about it as I was.’

The friends would spend hours talking about self-development, mindfulness and wellbeing. One day, they were sat in what was then The Yard café in Alderley Edge. ‘We said: “Imagine if there was a place we could go where we could find lots of this type of information, guidance and inspiration, whether that was a physical place or a digital place”,’ Katy remembers. ‘And at the time, as far as we knew, it didn’t exist, so we decided to create it.’

With the pair both working full-time, The Vibrancy Hub began as a side hustle, with Laura and Katy running women’s events on weekends. ‘We built up from there and, eventually, Laura jumped ship first,’ Katy says. ‘I joined her a little while later, and then we created the business full-time.’

Great British Life: A chance to get away from it allA chance to get away from it all (Image: Archant)

Laura describes the skillsets of the pair – who live about a 10-minute walk from each other in Knutsford and even share a pet dog – as ‘different but complementary’. ‘Katy is very thoughtful, very methodical and very much a detail person, and I’m “ideas”, “creative”, and I love the kind of business development, growth of the business, networking side of things,’ she says.

The outbreak of coronavirus has changed The Vibrancy Hub, but it certainly hasn’t derailed it. Laura and Katy have worked to ensure that the business’ offline elements are online – and Laura feels that online creation of a sense of community will be one of the biggest focuses for the company’s future. The company has been active on its social media accounts and has launched an online programme called 10 Days of Positivity, with advice and resources focused on helping individuals feel ‘calm’, ‘connected’ and ‘elevated’.

And with Laura describing hers and Katy’s life purpose as one of being a ‘cheerleader for people’, long may The Vibrancy Hub continue!

thevibrancyhub.co.uk