NAPPY cleaning business whizkid Sarah Jayne Edwards has lost her chance of a date with Prince Charles after suddenly quitting the country.

Sarah Jayne, from Rochester, was due to meet the Prince of Wales at the national final of The Prince's Trust and The Royal Bank of Scotland Group Business Awards later this year.

She was already the South East winner -- although she missed the presentation ceremony -- and was widely fancied to lift the national trophy.

The accolade would have been a boost for her and Medway's reputation as a great place to do business. But Sarah Jayne, reckoned to be one of the best young business prospects in the county, has unexpectedly shut down her nappy laundering business Baby Buddies and gone to Thailand to be with her husband and nine-month old daughter Summer.

Although she told staff, she kept Prince's Trust officials in the dark, even though they have backed her business for the past three years. Since she won the regional trophy on January 14, they have been desperately trying to contact her.

Ron Dunham, the Trust's Kent director, said he was very disappointed that Sarah Jayne had not been in touch since winning the award.

He said: "Since receiving the business of the year award in January, the Prince's Trust has been unable to contact Sarah Jayne Edwards. The Trust has therefore precluded Baby Buddies from going forward to the national final.

"As Sarah Janye Edwards is unable to be present for the judging, under these circumstances it has been decided that the runner-up Stephen Taylor of Prime Signs based in St Leonards, East Sussex, will go forward as the South East entry for the national final."

Meanwhile, hundreds of mums have been left without a nappy laundering service and several staff have lost their jobs.

Sarah Jayne founded Baby Buddies after being appalled by the wastefulness and environmental devastation caused by disposable nappies. They can take 500 years to decompose in landfill sites.

Her firm collected soiled nappies from customers once a week and delivered clean ones. It used local prison and hospital laundries before switching to its own equipment.

Sarah Jayne had claimed her service saved parents more than £100 a year compared to the cost of buying disposables. She once said: "If you put your baby in disposables, by the time he or she is potty-trained, around 6,000 nappies will have been used, creating over a ton of waste."

Kent County Council, which spends £2 million a year to dispose of nappies in landfill sites, backed Sarah Jayne through its War on Waste campaign.

Impressed by her enthusiasm, lively personality and business planning, the Trust lent her £4,200 to start Baby Buddies in 2000 and it has become a Medway business success story.

"We were hoping she would go on to greater things," said Mr Dunham. "I think she would have fared well in the final. She was a very strong candidate, there's no question about that, because of what she's achieved.

"That's the sad thing, she's achieved so much and all of a sudden, that seems to have counted for nothing."

He added that it was the first time in his 10 years in the job that a successful business supported by the Trust had closed.