Stirling businesswoman Ann-Maree Morrison has been awarded an MBE in recognition of her services to both women in business and the economy.
In 2004, Ann-Maree became one of the country’s first entrepreneurs to embrace and excel in the ecommerce sector, when she set up her multi-award-winning online business Labels4Kids.com.
Since then, as well as founding her free-to-all Ecommerce Club in 2011, she has also been appointed co-chair of W20 UK, the gender equality advisory group to the G20 for the UK.
Australian born Ann-Maree moved to the UK in 1990 to work in Chartered Accounting and then retail and moved to Scotland in 1995 as a management consultant. Her early experiences growing up with a parent in retail motivated her to continue her maths and languages (French and German) studies.
Ann-Maree’s business was founded after she started her family and was also involved in a major car accident.
These two life-changing events re-focussed for her what was important in life and a new business in ecommerce with the multi award winning Labels4Kids.com was the result.
Since founding Labels4Kids.com in 2004, Ann-Maree has taken an active role in supporting others starting out in business, or in education, and contributes in as many ways as possible.
In terms of her services to women in business, Ann-Maree has been a specialist advisor for many years to both the Scottish and the UK Governments on issues relating to SMEs, Women in Business, and Ecommerce, as well as to W20 internationally for the past six years.
A contributor to the Report and Ecommerce Task Force for Europe in 2012/13 with Lord Young, and a supporter of the Institute of Ecommerce in Scotland, Ann-Maree has also advised the W20 on gender equality with a specialist area of digital and SMEs. She is past chair of The British Association of Women Entrepreneurs in Scotland, and a Women Enterprise Scotland Ambassador.
With the Ecommerce Club, Ann-Maree freely shares her ecommerce knowledge and expertise with others with the aim of growing a supportive and highly skilled community of Scottish ecommerce specialists. She is also heavily involved in mentoring and speaking to young people on ecommerce, entrepreneurship, and learning languages.
Ann-Maree has worked with Young Enterprise Scotland as both a past board member, and a judge. She has hired and helped many university students and feels it is important to instil in the younger generation the importance of equality in everything, from care to work-life balance, and daily working life in business and of helping others in all their diversity, up the career ladder.
She said: “I am delighted to be a recipient of this honour from Her Majesty, particularly in this Jubilee year, and I’m thrilled to share it with my husband and family who have encouraged and supported me as an entrepreneur and business leader.
“Given my award was for services to women in business and the economy, I feel Her Majesty, summed it up perfectly when she recently said ‘Change has become a constant; managing it has become an expanding discipline’. This is so relevant to both ecommerce and women in business.”
Ann-Maree added: “It is of the utmost importance that ecommerce becomes more widely taught by specialists in the field, because the sector is moving at an unprecedented rate.
“To the best of my knowledge, there is still no fully accredited Ecommerce course approved in the UK, yet there is an ever-increasing demand for quality and qualified candidates to enter the sector. Addressing this head on is vital to grow the UK economy, particularly considering the accelerated rate with which ecommerce has grown as a result of Covid-19.”
Stirling’s Winter Olympic gold medal winning curlers have also been recognised.
The five-strong Team Muirhead and coach David Murdoch, all based at the PEAK in Stirling , have received accolades after claiming top honours for Great Britain at the Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Skip Eve Muirhead has picked up an OBE, while remaining team members Vicky Wright, Jen Dodds, Hailey Duff and Mili Smith — as well as British Curling head coach Murdoch — have scooped MBEs in the prestigious list.
The news comes after vice-skip Vicky, who also works as a nurse at Forth Valley Royal - announced her retirement from the sport last month. She told the Observer that the news of the award was a “special moment” which she was able to share with family, including her grandparents.
Vicky added: “It was just really, really cool to hear that I had got an MBE and I didn’t really know how to react - it is amazing. It’s the icing on top of the cake after retiring from the sport.”
Skip Muirhead, who had received an MBE for services to curling back in 2020, paid tribute to her team as she reflected on a special and extra successful year.
She said: “I am very pleased for all the girls to get their MBE’s and recognition of all that hard work and their achievements and I know many of them have so much more to offer in the sport and they have great futures ahead of them.”
Finally, Balfron woman Charlotte Hunt has been recognised for her work with Scotland’s Gardens Scheme over the decades.
Charlotte (74), the honorary vice president of Scotland’s Gardens Scheme, first got involved as a girl as her mother helped the organisation.
She became an area organiser in Stirlingshire and went on to become SGS chairman for five years from 2002.
She said of her OBE: “I’m very honoured and delighted. I’m very pleased not just for myself but for Scotland’s Gardens Scheme, which is such a wonderful charity.”
“Officially I have been involved with SGS since 1978, but unofficially since I was a child.
“My mother was involved with SGS and I would help her out with putting together posters publicisiing gardens to visit.
“It has been a lifetime interest.
“And I think this honour is particularly special since it is the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. It’s wonderful.”
