Kick-Off days offered  W-Power project international team memorable encounters with local enterprises as we visited Santa Claus Village enteprises as well as Pentik ceramics Design facilities in a nearby city of Posio. Most importantly the Kick-Off gave the project teams a chance to get to know each other and share ideas of future implementations of the project. What do our regions and women entrepreneurs have in common, what challenges do they face?

Meeting local women entrepreneurs

At Christmas House in Santa Claus Village Mrs. Inga-Pokka Jääskö told us her inspiring story as a woman entrepreneur, her company and her lifestyle all together. In Santa Claus Village we naturally got to meet the long bearded old gentleman himself and Arctic Reindeer Farm introduced us with their way of life with reindeer and different activities with reindeer. 

What does arctic ice cream taste like? Is it even colder than conventional ice cream? Mrs. Hanna-Riikka Lavia told us her story of entrepreneurship and introduced us her company Arctic Ice Cream Factory. During our bus trip to Posio we got to do some innovative brainstorming and networking and before Posio we made a stop at Himmerki Holiday Village to hear about accommodation services and activities in a holiday village surrounded by nature.

At Pentik Ltd. Mrs. Anu Posio, the founder of the company told us about becoming and being a woman entrepreneur. She told us how the Pentik Ltd started to grow and expand and also about the challenges she has had over the years of her entrepreneurship. A tour around the ceramics factory reveiled some interesting details of these exquisite designs of Pentik.

International Networking Seminar
The international networking seminar took place on the last day of our Kick-Off and it brought together women entrepreneurs, regional development authorities, business support organisations and all interested audience. All inspiring speakers of both international projects W-Power and ARCTISEN made the seminar absolutely impressive.