YOUNG tycoons showed off their business prowess at the area finals of Wiltshire's Young Enterprise competition.

During the finals at Cumberwell Park near Bradford on Avon on Tuesday night seven school teams submitted reports, gave presentations and were grilled by judges over plans for their businesses.

Their reports had all the dramas faced in business, from internal strife, walkouts and product difficulties to customer thefts.

But there was also plenty of success as they told how some of them had made up to £1,000 profit in just six months.

The clear winners in the central area final were St Augustine's Catholic College in Trowbridge, whose Wrap Attack form designed and made wrapping paper.

Managing director Emily Fitzgerald said: We had lots of ideas but we all agreed this was the best and we worked hard on market research to make sure we had the right products.'' A pivotal role was played by IT director Helen Long's gran, who baked enough biscuits for the eight girls in the team to sell in order to raise their start-up capital.

Runners-up were X-Events from George Ward School in Melksham, who organised discos, ice-skating trips and are now planning a surfing trip and James Bond evening.

In third place were Dauntsey's in West Lavington whose Sprint team's principle enterprise was selling hand-made candles from the school's own bee hives.

All three teams will go through to the Wiltshire finals in Swindon on May 15.

Joining them will be the Ozone team from Bradon Forest School in Purton who won the north area final.

Managing director Ben Keeping and his team of eight told how they made cash by selling USB memory sticks. They sourced their own suppliers and undercut Asda and Tesco.

Ben told how they overcame a theft of £40 of stock during one break-time sale to stay in profit. Also taking part in the central final were John Bentley School in Calne and the Corsham School.

Corsham's youngsters told how their biggest challenge was to persuade their own teachers to take them seriously. Operations director Emma Newman said: "We had to organise a meeting with them to explain what Young Enterprise was.'' The evening was sponsored by Cumberwell and Monahans. YE development manager Andrew Martin said: The youngsters have been brilliant. The standard is very high.''