COULD YOUR BUSINESS BE PRIDE OF YORKSHIRE?

You might be:

A cheesemaker in the Yorkshire Dales.

A chocolatier in York.

A coffee roaster in Leeds.

A skincare producer in Harrogate.

A candle maker in Sheffield.

A jewellery designer in Whitby.

A pet treat producer in Halifax.

Or an independent Yorkshire business creating something completely different.

If you make or sell products people across Yorkshire would love to discover, we'd like to hear from you.ONE IMPORTANT REQUIREMENT

Participating merchants must be able to sell and ship their products Yorkshire-wide.

Pride of Yorkshire is a county-wide initiative.

Someone discovering your business in Scarborough, Sheffield, Skipton or Selby should have the opportunity to become your customer.

10 MAIN CATEGORIES

🐾 10. PETS

Food, treats, accessories, beds, gifts and products for Yorkshire's four-legged residents.

To make Pride of Yorkshire simple for consumers to explore, participating merchants will be organised into 10 broad categories.

🧀 1. FOOD

Cheese, bakery, chocolate, meat, pies, confectionery, preserves, sauces, honey, snacks, farm produce, hampers, speciality foods and more.

☕ 2. DRINK

Coffee, tea, soft drinks, juices, mixers and other Yorkshire drinks.

🎁 3. GIFTS

Gift boxes, hampers, personalised gifts, keepsakes, Yorkshire gifts and unusual presents.

🏡 4. HOME & LIVING

Homeware, furnishings, ceramics, candles, textiles, kitchenware and decorative products.

👗 5. FASHION

Clothing, knitwear, outdoor clothing, independent labels and Yorkshire-designed fashion.

👜 6. ACCESSORIES & JEWELLERY

Jewellery, bags, leather goods, watches and fashion accessories.

🧴 7. BEAUTY & WELLBEING

Skincare, soaps, bath products, fragrances, natural beauty and wellbeing products.

🎨 8. ART, CRAFT & DESIGN

Artwork, prints, photography, stationery, crafts and independently designed products.

🌿 9. GARDEN & OUTDOORS

Garden products, planters, tools, outdoor accessories and products for enjoying Yorkshire outdoors.

This is important.

A Founder does not secure an entire category such as Food or Home & Living.

They secure their own clearly defined product niche.

For example, Food could eventually include:

Founder Cheesemaker

Founder Chocolatier

Founder Bakery

Founder Pie Maker

Founder Honey Producer

Founder Sauce Brand

Founder Preserves Brand

Founder Confectioner

Founder Hamper Company

…and many more.

Drink could include:

• Founder Coffee Roaster

• Founder Tea Brand

• Founder Soft Drinks Producer.

Beauty could include separate Founder positions for:

• Skincare

• Handmade soaps

• Fragrance and other clearly differentiated niches.

ONE FOUNDER PER AGREED NICHE.

That gives each Founder something meaningful to protect without preventing Pride of Yorkshire from representing the extraordinary variety of Yorkshire independents.

FOUNDER EXCLUSIVITY WORKS AT NICHE LEVEL

Secure the Founder position for your product niche.

Founder Merchants aren't simply being given a listing.

We're creating a more substantial digital asset around their business.

Your Founder package includes:

✓ EXCLUSIVE FOUNDER POSITION

Secure the Pride of Yorkshire Founder position for your agreed product niche during the 2026 launch phase.

We'll create a mobile-friendly BuddyCard for your business.

It can introduce your business, showcase products and provide direct links to the places customers actually want to go.

That could include:

Shop Online

Instagram

Facebook

TikTok

Contact Us

Our Story

Featured Products

and other useful destinations.

Your BuddyCard isn't intended to be something people see once and forget.

You'll receive a QR code you can encourage customers and followers to scan.

Use it:

On packaging.

At markets and events.

At your shop counter.

On leaflets.

On social media.

Inside parcels.

At exhibitions.

Or anywhere else your customers encounter your brand.

A customer can scan the QR code, open your BuddyCard and save it to their phone or home screen.

So the next time they want to find you, shop with you or recommend you…

YOUR BUSINESS IS ALREADY THERE.

Your Founder BuddyCard will also include a simple AI BuddyBot trained around key information about your business.

For example, someone visiting a Yorkshire cheesemaker might ask:

“Which cheeses do you make?”

“Do you sell gift boxes?”

“Which cheese would you recommend for a cheeseboard?”

“Do you deliver to Leeds?”

“Where is your cheese made?”

The first generation of BuddyBots will deliberately be kept straightforward.

Our goal is to make them useful, rather than overcomplicated.

More advanced conversational experiences such as Buddy50Q and Buddy100Q can follow as Pride of Yorkshire develops.

Founder Merchants will be included within the Pride of Yorkshire merchant discovery experience so consumers can find and explore participating independents by category and product niche.

Founder Merchants will be invited to participate in our major seasonal campaigns throughout the year.

These campaigns are designed to give Yorkshire consumers repeated reasons to discover participating businesses.

Founder Merchants receive enhanced recognition throughout Pride of Yorkshire and its campaigns.

You aren't simply participating.

YOU'RE HELPING BUILD IT.

The Founder fee covers your Pride of Yorkshire launch-phase Founder package during 2026.

Founder Merchants will then receive first refusal to continue their exclusive Founder position from January 2027 on a monthly membership basis.

There is no requirement for us to limit Pride of Yorkshire to 10 Founder businesses.

Quite the opposite.

We want Yorkshire represented by cheesemakers, chocolatiers, coffee roasters, artists, skincare businesses, jewellery makers, pet businesses, homeware brands and many more.

THE LIMIT IS SIMPLY ONE FOUNDER PER AGREED NICHE.

Not every business needs Founder exclusivity or its own Founder BuddyCard.

That's why we're also opening Pride of Yorkshire to:

MEMBER MERCHANTS

Member Merchants can join for:

£47 PER MONTH

Membership includes:

✓ Pride of Yorkshire App presence

✓ Inclusion within your relevant category and niche

✓ Business and product discovery

✓ Link to your online store

✓ Participation in our quarterly giveaway campaigns

✓ Opportunities to contribute prizes, products and promotional vouchers

Multiple Member Merchants can participate within the same niche.

The exclusivity relates specifically to the Founder position.

Because a genuinely attractive prize gives people a reason to pay attention.

And when many independent merchants contribute prizes together, something interesting happens.

Instead of:

ONE BUSINESS. ONE PRIZE. ONE SMALL AUDIENCE.

we can create:

MANY BUSINESSES. LOTS OF PRIZES. ONE MUCH BIGGER CAMPAIGN.

A merchant might contribute:

A product.

Several products.

A gift box.

A hamper.

A £25 voucher against a qualifying order.

Or another suitable prize.

The more merchants participate, the stronger the prize pool becomes.

And the stronger the prize pool becomes, the more compelling the campaign can become for consumers.

We favour big quarterly campaigns rather than constantly bombarding people with competitions.

That gives Pride of Yorkshire a natural seasonal rhythm.

SPRING

WIN FREE YORKSHIRE PRODUCTS

A seasonal collection of prizes from Yorkshire independents.

SUMMER

WIN FREE YORKSHIRE PRODUCTS

Fresh seasonal products and discoveries from across Yorkshire.

AUTUMN

WIN FREE YORKSHIRE PRODUCTS

Another major opportunity to showcase participating businesses.

DECEMBER

WIN FREE FOOD & DRINK FOR A YEAR 2027!

Our flagship annual campaign.

A much larger prize promotion built around products, vouchers and contributions from Pride of Yorkshire merchants.

A new calendar year gives the campaign a natural reason to ask:

WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO WIN FREE FOR A YEAR?

We want to be completely transparent about this.

Pride of Yorkshire plans to use UpViral, a specialist referral and giveaway marketing platform, to help run our campaigns.

Rather than relying only on paid advertising, UpViral allows campaigns to encourage entrants to share with friends and earn additional opportunities or rewards for doing so.

That creates the potential for one entrant to introduce another…

who introduces another…

who introduces another.

WE ARE NOT PROMISING “VIRAL” RESULTS.

No marketing platform can guarantee those.

But UpViral has published an extensive collection of case studies showing how businesses and organisations have used referral-driven giveaways to grow audiences across many different markets.

VIEW THE UPVIRAL CASE STUDIES →

We think merchants considering Pride of Yorkshire should be able to see the technology and examples behind the strategy for themselves.

UpViral is only part of the plan.

Imagine 50 participating Yorkshire businesses each telling their own customers and social followers:

“We're part of Pride of Yorkshire — enter to Win Yorkshire!”

Now imagine 100.

Or 500.

Every participating merchant has their own customers, email subscribers and social followers.

Instead of those audiences remaining isolated, Pride of Yorkshire gives us an opportunity to bring them together around a shared campaign.

EVERY MERCHANT ADDS TO THE AUDIENCE.

EVERY NEW ENTRANT ADDS TO THE AUDIENCE.

EVERY CAMPAIGN BUILDS ON THE LAST.

That's the bigger idea behind Pride of Yorkshire.

The giveaways attract attention.

But they're not the end goal.

The goal is to create an audience of Yorkshire consumers interested in:

Independent businesses

Yorkshire products

Local discoveries

Special offers

New merchants

Seasonal campaigns

and supporting businesses closer to home.

Over time, Pride of Yorkshire should become increasingly useful to merchants because the audience already exists.

We don't want Pride of Yorkshire to become another page containing hundreds of logos that nobody visits.

We want people to:

Discover a merchant.

Read their story.

Explore their products.

Ask their BuddyBot a question.

Visit their online store.

Scan their QR code.

Save their BuddyCard.

Follow them.

Buy from them.

And hopefully…

KEEP BUYING FROM THEM.

This is one of the ideas we're particularly excited about.

A Founder Merchant can encourage their existing customers to scan and save their BuddyCard.

So Pride of Yorkshire isn't solely trying to find you new customers.

Your BuddyCard can also help you remain connected to the customers and followers you already have.

Once someone has your business saved conveniently on their phone, you have become that little bit easier to return to.

This is one of the ideas we're particularly excited about.

A Founder Merchant can encourage their existing customers to scan and save their BuddyCard.

So Pride of Yorkshire isn't solely trying to find you new customers.

Your BuddyCard can also help you remain connected to the customers and followers you already have.

Once someone has your business saved conveniently on their phone, you have become that little bit easier to return to.

As the Pride of Yorkshire audience grows, so do the possibilities.

More merchant discovery.

More seasonal campaigns.

More ways to showcase products.

More AI-powered merchant experiences.

More opportunities for participating businesses to be featured.

And new services such as AI promotional video and enhanced Buddy experiences can be introduced for merchants who want even greater visibility.

But first we need to build the foundation.

And that starts with Yorkshire's independent businesses.

Secure the exclusive Founder position for your agreed product niche.

Includes your Founder BuddyCard, BuddyBot, QR assets, enhanced presence and participation in Pride of Yorkshire campaigns.

Founder Merchants receive first refusal to continue their position on a monthly basis from January 2027.

BECOME A FOUNDER MERCHANT →

Join Pride of Yorkshire, appear within the App and participate in our quarterly campaigns.

JOIN AS A MEMBER MERCHANT →

CAN YOU SHIP YOUR PRODUCTS ACROSS YORKSHIRE?

If the answer is yes…

and you're proud of what your independent business creates or sells…

WE'D LOVE TO HAVE YOU INVOLVED.

PRIDE OF YORKSHIRE

DISCOVER YORKSHIRE. SHOP INDEPENDENT. BUY YORKSHIRE.