The creatives making an impact around the world - and other top business news from Dorset and Hampshire

Not everyone knows about it, but many of our creative and digital businesses in Dorset and Hampshire are making an impact around the world.

For example, we reported this week how the leading American marketer and author Mark Schaefer has held up a Poole-based marketing community as a case study in his latest book.

Meanwhile, a party from a Poole marketing business reported back on their experience at the world's biggest consumer technology show , CES.

And a Dorset creative agency whose work includes those Lakeland kitchen products catalogues is opening a New York office .

Other top stories this week

• I enjoyed a visit to Solent Business Centre in Millbrook, which in times gone by was the Toogood & Sons seed factory. Ninety-three of its 97 units are occupied, with tenants ranging from an aromatherapists to light engineering and a YouTuber with 1.13m subscribers.
• Christchurch's Business Improvement District (BID) has reported on a successful first year . (Report by Georgia Revell.)
• And in Southampton, an expert appointed by the city's BID, GO! Southampton,to advise its levy payers has been credited with saving high street businesses ￡55,000.
• Closures are a sadly familiar part of the business news now. This week, Shivalika Puri reported on the imminent closure of a Southampton Indian restaurant after more than 30 years, while Alexander Smith covered the demise of an independent shop in Poole's Dolphin Centre.
• The online car seller Cazoo is consulting over plans to close its Southampton centre among other sites across the country.
• Redundancies are planned at an employer with hundreds of staff in Dorset.
• A nutrition and supplement brand has raised ￡556,000 from investors after turning over ￡2m in its second year.
• A Dorset perfumery has been sold after an insolvency practitioner was called in. (Report by Andrew Goldman.)
• One of the best-known figures in the local IT sector has been tempted out of retirement by an expanding business.
• A charity in Dorset is gearing up for the national rollout of its programme to help people with special educational needs into self-employment .
• There's a Dorset connection to that High Court case you may have read about in which actress Eva Green is suing for a million dollar salary for a film that was never made.
• A Hampshire energy supplier is urging the government to provide more help for the vulnerable with their bills after April.
• There's more positive news from Christchurch's Regent Centre which last week unveiled a ￡60,000 new screen . It has submitted plans for a new entrance which would make it properly compliant with the Disability Discrimination Act.
• And the winners of the Dorset Tourism Awards were announced at the first in-person ceremony for three years. Congratulations if you were among them.

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