Stelios launches young entrepreneur awards 2025
Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, creator and owner of the easy family of brands (see www.easyHistory.info) is offering cash prizes totalling £300,000 to three young entrepreneurs in the UK for the second year.
The awards will be open from 6 January 2025 for owners of start-ups younger than 34 years old born in 1990 or later. The closing date for entries is 28 March 2025.
Businesses must have been registered at UK Companies House in the last five years since 2019, with accounts showing revenues of at least £200,000 per year.
Applicant entrepreneurs must be a director of the company and own shares of more than 50%.
The overall winner will win a prize of £150,000 to invest in their business, with a second prize of £100,000 and third prize of £50,000.
Applications are via a downloadable form from www.stelios.foundation and emailed to tracy.ghori@stelios.com by 5pm on March 28th, 2025. The winners being announced by Sir Stelios at a ceremony via Zoom on April 29th, 2025.
The inaugural awards last year saw the biggest grant go to Amelia Christie-Miller, a former chef who launched the Bold Bean Co www.boldbeanco.com in 2021 with the goal of “making beans interesting again”.
Tom Ushakov, of the London Pregnancy Clinic www.londonpregnancy.com took home the second prize, while Charlotte Stavrou nee Williams’s Sevensix Agency www.sevensixagency.com took home the last grant.
Sir Stelios said: “I have a long track record over 30 years of helping to create tens of thousands of jobs in the UK – both on the for-profit side by creating the easy family of brands (www.easy.com) but also with my charitable foundation and the existing awards for disabled entrepreneurs. The quality of the entries and winners last year proves once again that in the UK today entrepreneurship is very much alive and kicking! Therefore, I look forward to seeing another batch of inspiring applications again this year from that great pool of entrepreneurial talent.”
Amelia Christie-Miller, CEO of the Bold Bean Co, said: “Winning the Stelios Young Entrepreneur Award was a total game-changer for Bold Bean Co. The support, recognition, and sheer belief we’ve received since has been instrumental in helping us put beans exactly where they belong – right at the heart of people’s kitchens across the UK.
"It’s been a real springboard for growth. Since winning, we’ve expanded our product range, landed exciting new retail partnerships, and made huge strides in our mission to make humble beans a loved and celebrated food staple.
"The prize money? Honestly, transformative. It’s helped us invest in even more sustainable, high-quality beans and scale up operations to meet the growing demand. But more than that, it’s allowed us to keep breaking rules and pushing boundaries with product innovation – the kind that gets people genuinely excited about beans.
"I first heard about the Stelios Awards simply through an email forwarded from a friend, and I can’t recommend them enough. It’s not just the financial support – though that’s huge – but the validation and exposurethat comes with it. For any entrepreneur with a big, bold vision, this could be the thing that propels you to the next level."
The Stelios Philanthropic Foundation which is launching and funding the award has the stated mission of supporting a very diverse range of good causes but “close to home” i.e., in the local communities that Sir Stelios and his family have lived and worked and of course the UK is one of them. The foundation has been running very successful similar entrepreneur’s awards in Greece and Cyprus supporting job creation in the local economies for many years. The majority of the profits of easyGroup go to the Foundation.
