Hundreds of places the world over have been noted for their inspiring qualities.

Many thousands flock to see the rolling waters of Niagra Falls, while others clamber to experience the mountainous hills of Canada first hand.

But for Spencer Gallagher, the most inspiring place in the world happened to be a little closer to home.

Tucked away in the unlikely location of the back garden of his mother’s Camberley home, her humble purple shed has become the birthplace of one of the largest digital agencies in the world — Bluhalo.

Specialising in website design, Bluhalo is the provider of bespoke websites to the likes of Liverpool FC and The FA Premier League, among a host of other top names.

The company now has a turnover of £3million a year and was listed for the Deloitte Fast 50 Awards in 2007.

Not bad for Spencer who finished his education at Tomlinscote School in Frimley with no qualifications.

With monthly viewing figures for his websites hitting around 28 million, the 37-year-old admits he has come a long way from the four walls he started out in.

Having first dabbled with the internet in 1994, it was not until five years later that Spencer seized the chance to start his own business, using £4,500 he was handed after he was made redundant from a small sales and marketing company. He said: “I very quickly realised the potential the internet had from the first time I went on it.

“I knew websites would be the key so I learned how to build them in my spare time while I was working for other people. I always knew I would own my own business. It was just a question of waiting for the big idea.”

This five years later when the father-of-two from Fleet read an article on what was wrong with most websites today and the components that could potentially create the perfect one.

Spencer said: “That was one of the key moments for me.

“The article said most websites are either visually creative or really technical and the key to making a website a success was to get the geeks and the creative freaks working together. That was what I set about doing when I started Bluhalo.

“I have always been a bit of a closet techie but I knew I was never going to be a specialist at building websites, which is where other people have come into it.”

From the one man band it once started out as, Bluhalo now boasts a workforce of 40, including programmers, graphic designers and of course, those all-important creative types.

And then there was some great news last week with the company’s acquisition by Mighty Mouse Digital, the digital arm of Gyro Inter-national, on May 13.

This is one of the fastest growing agencies in the UK, providing digital services for a host of big names, including Virgin Atlantic, Shell and T-Mobile.

This is not bad for Spencer, who readily admits being the least qualified of all of Bluhalo’s staff.

“I grew up in Camberley and left Tomlinscote School at 16 years old with no qualifications at all,” he said.

Spencer will remain chief executive of Bluhalo and will also join Mighty Mouse Digital as European Head of Strategy, a role that will see him respon-sible for strategic operations across seven countries.

“The business has grown organically from a one man band I started myself and built up over the years to the point where I recruited a team and we are where we are today.

“We’ve been on the look-out for an agency with an estab-lished global presence that could allow us to showcase our services on an international platform.

“Mighty Mouse Digital was the natural choice for us; sharing a culture closely aligned to our own and with joint ambitions to build a world class digital agency.

“I’m delighted at the pros-pect of working at the helm of Mighty Mouse Digital’s Euro-pean business and will relish the challenge driving the business forwards.

“It’s also a fantastic thing for Farnborough to have a digital centre of excellence.

“I have a fantastic range of talented people, all with degrees working with me which is brilliant but there is a lot of pressure on young people these days that to make it in life you have to get good quali-fications.

“I am a good example and living proof that that is not always the case.”

For more information, visit www.bluhalo.com.