Amanda Glover is on a mission – and it has nothing to do with her work as managing partner of Farnham solicitors BakerLaw.

Amanda is president of the town’s Chamber of Commerce – and she is determined to make it a major force in the local business landscape.

But Amanda knows she has a job on her hands – until recently, the chamber had somewhat lost its way.

“It had its regular members and attendees, but I think the events were becoming less well attended because they weren’t particularly targeted to what businesses wanted,” she said.

“I think the face of industry has changed and the voice they need has changed as well.

“The chamber had become far too slow. It basically needed a shake-up.

“It needed someone to strip it all back, take away everything and look at what was good. And what was good was the membership base.

“When I was nominated as president, I was happy to take it on as long as people were happy we threw everything out and effectively started again, reconnecting with the current membership and getting back on board some of the people who had left over the past few years.”

And that policy is working.

Amanda says: “We’ve got a far better connection now with Waverley Borough Council.

“They are still the people who control the environment we are working in.

“You can’t expect them to listen or to change anything unless they get the right information through the right channels and in the right way.”

Businesses are responding to the energetic new chamber, Amanda believes.

“A lot of the businesses that drifted away have come back. We’ve had a 40 per cent increase in membership in the year since our last annual general meeting.

“We now work better with the other chambers within Waverley, which had become fairly disjointed.

“We hold fewer events now but they are better quality. Our cheese and wine evening at the new gallery was sold out – we had a limit of 45 people yet 50 still turned up.

“We had fantastic sponsors for good wine and good cheese, and we were supporting local businesses – everything was locally sourced.

“And people had the opportunity to network – and we heard that business had flowed from that. It’s not just information sharing, it’s about supporting local business.”

But there is still a lot of work to be done.

“Our membership still represents a small percentage of the businesses in Farnham and that’s still one of the challenges.

“We need to be reaching out more to the business units. The town centre is a central hub but around that is a wealth of business.

“I don’t think we’re hitting enough there. And we have to reach out more to retail. They don’t have enough of a voice in the chamber.

“Businesses will, quite fairly, ask what the chamber will do for them.

“Some of them still see Waverley as the enemy. But they’re inviting our views and consulting with us, no longer in a dismissive way but with a genuinely engaging approach.

“It’s great for us to have social evenings and we don’t want to lose those because business can be done with other businesses. But it’s also really important to look at what the pressure points are in the town.

“Some people talk about the adverse effect there will be on the town with Brightwells and Woolmead, with roads or services.

“But let’s spin this round and ask what opportunities will those builds bring to the area? What about the opportunities for the retail already here? How can they tap into that?”

One of the items on the town’s agenda is whether to introduce a Business Improvement District.

Under that scheme, firms would pay a levy on their business rates – perhaps an extra one and a half per cent – which would be ringfenced to improve the town.

Amanda says: “We have spoken about whether it’s something the chamber should be involved in – but it should not be the chamber’s decision. It should be the business owners who decide whether to do it.”

The chamber’s annual meeting and lunch takes place tomorrow (Friday) at the Bush Hotel at midday – and Amanda has no plans to step down.

“I’ve only just started – I can’t leave it half baked.

“We’re lucky because we have have very few empty shops – the lowest percentage of any of the other boroughs in Waverley – so Farnham must be doing something right.

“So imagine how much better it could be if more people joined in and had a voice.

“I would like to be able to say that at least 50 per cent of all businesses – whether that’s retail, office-based businesses or service providers – are members in the chamber.

“Ideally, I’d like three-quarters of the businesses being a member so we actually struggled to get venues that can hold us all.”