Member Article

Latifs honoured at Midlands Arts & Business Awards

Latif’s Stores have been honoured at the Midlands Arts and Business awards as Business Champions following a successful collaboration with Birmingham based music development agency Punch Records. Due to the strength of the partnership, the judges of the event have selected this partnership to be put forward into the Cultural Champions category for the National awards ceremony taking place in London on 14th May 2013.

Latif’s Stores’ investment of £30,000 over 1 year is believed to be the single philanthropic donation to the arts in the West Midlands from a South Asian Business. This ground-breaking pledge will secure hundreds of hours of new arts activities for thousands of young people across the Midlands and will support Punch’s cultural development work in local neighbourhoods.

The 34th Arts and Business Awards celebrates successful partnerships between businesses and arts organisations. The category of Business Champion is an England-wide programme that celebrates and applauds the work of exceptional individuals, from a commercial background, who support the arts either with time, money, or skills.

Kashif Latif, brand ambassador of Latif’s Stores and Vice President of the Institute of Asian Businesses (IAB), said: “My grandfather founded Latif’s in 1956 by selling household goods door-to-door. His entrepreneurial spirit and family values are still evident today. As a company we have a strong commitment to supporting local communities. By associating with Punch Records and their programmes, such as Desi Moves, we feel it is a great way for us to be involved with promoting young talent. We are honoured to partner with Punch to provide such a great platform for our local people.”

CEO of Punch Records, Ammo Talwar, said: “Latif’s Stores has become a powerful advocate for local arts, both within their own family business and within the wider commercial community. He has worked tirelessly to build bridges between Punch and the Institute of Asian Businesses (IAB), which led to Punch being nominated for three awards at the IAB Silver Jubilee event last November. Their energetic campaigning has opened the door for us to sit down with local business leaders, kick-starting new networking, and providing opportunities for us to break new ground with our flagship community programme. Latif’s has become a true ambassador for all Punch Records projects.”

Punch Records works nationally and internationally to champion music and the arts through music workshops, bespoke educational packages, event promotion, large-scale concerts and club nights. They offer substantial music based training programmes that enable young people to unlock their inner talent and are an official Arts Award centre.

Punch Records are constantly striving to find commercial collaborations, this is imperative to the success of their organisation. By working with people like Kashif Latif they are able to maintain current youth training programmes, expand the new ‘Desi Moves’ community programme, publicise their forthcoming BASS (Black Arts and Street Sounds) music festival and explore other avenues for bringing music, art and spoken word to the wider community both nationally and internationally.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Punch Records .