Since the organisation moved to new premises in June inquiries have soared by 28 per cent.
br>Executive director Lydia Cook said those figures indicated a growing sense of business awareness, helped along by the surge in TV programmes like The Apprentice and Dragon’s Den.
br>She said: ‘It may well be helped by the fact that there are more and more programmes about enterprise – I do think they have brought about more general business awareness.
Quite a lot of people do think of new ideas and new products and that type of publicity can help them realise that they can take it further.