PRIME business club

What’s the best way to structure a compensation system for partners in a small startup firm?  This article by US business writer David Maister makes some interesting points that apply equally here.

Karen and Errol Spires, who are aged 46 and 60 respectively, are a husband and wife team who have gone into business together. They run a fish and chip shop in Grimsby, the historic seaport on the south bank of the Humber estuary in Lincolnshire.

In the 1950s Grimsby was the largest fishing port in the world. Although the industry has been in decline for many years since, Grimsby still has the UK’s largest fish market and many food producers are based in the town.

When they decided to move into self-employment, Karen and Errol had both been working for some years at a local pizza chain. The idea of running their own business was suggested to them by Karen’s stepfather.

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Linda March, who is over 50, is currently setting up a rather unusual business. Called Court Support, it provides a service to witnesses attending a Court of Law or similar hearing.

Linda attends Court with the witness. She supports them throughout the experience by explaining the court process, helping with their testimony or statement and dealing with resulting press queries.

Linda previously worked for a public sector organisation and delivered a similar court support service for the staff. This service was well received by both staff and their managers. There seemed plenty of demand for this rather specialised area of public relations.

When her job came to an end Linda thought that this was an idea she might be able to turn into a free-standing Court Support business. It would give her the chance to put her energies into something new.
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Being Scottish, Eleanor Dowds, 53, probably appreciates the well-known words of Burns about the best-laid schemes of mice and men “going aft agley”.

Having worked for more than 30 years as a nurse, Eleanor, who is based in Cheshire, has been planning a move into self-employment for her middle years – but her plans have had to be put on hold for the time being.

“I had planned to take early retirement, which is possible in the NHS at 55, and that would free me up to have a career diversion, into building up a business,” explains Eleanor.

The new career that Eleanor has been planning is in the home-staging business, making homes more appealing to potential buyers. Eleanor and her husband have direct experience of enhancing homes, not only through having renovated two houses in which they have lived themselves, but also through having bought and renovated two properties to rent out.

Using a combination of workmen and their own efforts, Eleanor and her husband have carried out a wide range of renovations, including installing central heating, rewiring, plastering, installing new bathroom and decorating. This has been possible, explains Eleanor, because until recently, she was working only three days a week in her job as a nurse in a local hospital operating theatre, giving her the time she needed to work on her house project.

Two years ago, the couple moved into the house in which they now live and carried out extensive renovation. “It was as we finished that work that I realised that I could probably develop this as a business,” Eleanor says.

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Harry Dennis set up his own business in October 2005, when he was 51. Based in Stockport, Harry has worked in the chemical industry his entire career and has now built on his experience by setting up an environmental consultancy, Dennis Environmental Ltd, which specialises in waste management, in particular waste minimisation and hazardous waste for the chemical industry.

“I was working for a company in Manchester that was transferring a lot of production over to India and China,” explains Harry. “Eventually, the company announced that the site where I worked would close and I decided to leave almost immediately. I had no plans to take early retirement.”

Instead, Harry decided to capitalise on the skills he had learned most recently in employment.

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This Daily Telegraph article warns against relying on politician’s promises to give you an adequate income in retirement. Unless you’re happy with amounts like £84.25 a week - currently the full basic state pension, or perhaps £109.45 a week if you qualify for full Pension Credit, you will need to make your own arrangements. But at the moment many self- employed aren’t doing enough to ensure their future

Read on…

Brenda El-Leithy, 59, is a good example of someone who has had to re-learn skills in a changing market place.  Her business, Mind2Mind, provides hypnotherapy and personal development workshops.

Brenda had run her own personal development business for several years before personal circumstances required a move to Wales, away from her base in Sutton, Surrey. When she returned to Sutton several years later, restarting her business meant learning new skills.

“When I came back, the whole business scene had changed,” explains Brenda. “The whole environment is now very different and I have had to look at different approaches.”

As part of her re-skilling, Brenda attended the London Metropolitan University’s Forward at 50 course for women setting up their own businesses, and found it very useful in giving her new ideas.

In the past, Brenda used to advertise her personal development workshops and services in glossy magazines. “This time, networking is the key,” she says. “It was emphasised on the course - and I have certainly discovered that networking is absolutely vital. Now, I advertise in the local paper every two weeks, but the rest of my business comes from personal recommendation and networking.”

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Mike Lloyd has demonstrated that business ideas can sometimes come from unexpected places. After a career advising other people on how to set up their own businesses, Mike has now, at 60, found himself running his own business, delivering flowers.

“I committed a cardinal sin,” comments Mike. “I went into something that I knew nothing at all about. It meant I really had to hit the ground running and learning about this new business has been hard work.”

Mike has set up Flying Flowers Network, a delivery service for florists in the North Somerset area. It is not something he had expected to be doing. For many years, Mike was a business advisor. He has worked for PRIME, and his most recent job was working as a regional development manager for the InBiz organisation. “It was an interesting job, working with socially disadvantaged clients and helping them into self-employment,” he explains. That job came to an end when he was made redundant, following funding cuts. “It was a purely financial decision and entirely amicable,” he says.

Initially, Mike was not too concerned about his change in circumstances and intended to get another permanent job. But it was harder than he anticipated. “I had lots of experience and first-hand knowledge in a management role, supervising staff, so I thought I would apply for a similar job in the south west,” he says. “So I started applying for jobs, but got nothing. Then, one Sunday, my wife and I were at a garden centre and I saw an ad from a new florist, wanting a driver and I thought that would that would do me until something else came along.” A week later, Mike had begun his new job, as a van driver.

“The first job I did was a delivery to a local undertaker. When I arrived, three separate florists’ vans were also delivering flowers,” says Mike. “I could see at once how inefficient that was, so I suggested to the florist employing me that if I invoiced him, rather than working directly for him, I could do deliveries not just for them but for all the local florists and that way, I could help them to reduce all their costs.”

Having had this idea, Mike did an outline of his business plans and spent three months researching the market. “I needed to see if anyone else was doing this, and no-one was,” he says.

The chief objection to Mike’s new delivery service was one he anticipated: all the florists he approached said they already had their own delivery van. “So I had to go away and regroup,” he explains. Researching the market further, Mike discovered that all the local florists belonged to different telephone ordering services. By delivering these orders himself, he could save the florists money. In order to make this business viable, Mike has had to discover a great deal, very quickly, about the flower business and how it operates. “The florists have been very good,” he says. “They tell me about the way things work.” But it has still been a challenge. It’s been a vertical learning curve,” he admits. “But I now work for nine florists and have three part-time workers.”

In four months, Mike has trebled his turnover and the business is now self-sufficient. “I haven’t had to put any money into the business,” he explains. “The trick is not to spend too much in the first year and not to borrow if at all possible.”

Mike is now anticipating a rush in the run up to Christmas, and then a quiet period afterwards, in which he wants to get a website up and running and get uniforms made for his staff.

“The challenges have been the same as for any new business, except that I have had to learn about a completely new subject,” he points out. Mike feels his background, which includes 26 years in the police, has helped him in different ways. “I know a lot of former police officers, many of whom are now self-employed and who are willing to help out with the odd afternoon or day, so I can turn that on and off as demand ebbs and flows,” he says.

Setting up the business has been demanding and involves long working hours. “My first delivery is at 8am and the trick in this is to develop a circle of routes, so I can move round one and then another,” explains Mike. “I’ve generally finished by 5pm, so it’s not a bad working day, but of course the downside is that I have to work on Saturdays. In fact, I have suggested Sunday morning deliveries, at a premium, so I now also work about one Sunday each month.”

Mike has delved deep into this market and now knows a great deal about flower selling in the UK. “I keep things simple and I keep asking questions,” he says. “I’ve learned things I knew nothing about, in double-quick time. It is really exciting.”

While it may seem to have put Mike under pressure to start a business in a completely new market, his reaction to the experience is different. “My previous job was a highly-pressured job,” he says. “I was earning a good salary, but I was having to travel constantly. Now, I think I could do this job for another 10 years. The other morning, for instance, I had just made a delivery and had a spare 35 minutes, so parked by the sea, had a double espresso, read the paper and thought - this is the life.”

Mike may be enjoying his new life, but he believes it is important to keep one’s business feet firmly on the ground. “If you spot an opportunity, you must rationalise it,” he advises. “You need to do the research and development. Then you need to incorporate all that into a plan and stick to the plan. If that doesn’t work, you need to write a new plan - and then stick to that.”

He also believes it is a mistake to expand too fast. “I think it’s a good idea to move on steadily, rather than rush on,” he says.

Norma Vondee, 54, is an artist. She creates mosaics and mosaic sculptures and has run her own mosaics business, Norma Vondee Mosaics, for the past five years. Her biggest struggle continues to be the contrast between the business side of the work and the artistic side.

“I still find it difficult that I have to spend two days a week trying to get the work and only three days a week making the work,” comments Norma. “I’d really like to be spending five days a week making the work.”

Graham Siggs is 61. He started his own electrical testing service two years ago and intends to keep his business going for quite some time yet.

“I have a quality product that I intend to sell as long as I can, and then sell as a going concern,” Graham comments.

Graham is based in Somersham, near Cambridge, and his business, HuntsPAT, is a testing service for portable electrical devices. It’s a business that Graham finds easy to run and that fits in well with his substantial experience and his desire to continue working after the age at which he was forced to retire from the civil service.

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For Sally Walton, it was a combination of external and internal factors that prompted her to set up her ecological design business, Carry-A-Bag (www.carry-a-bag.com).

Sally, who is 55 and based in St Leonard’s on Sea, in East Sussex in southern England, had been working with her husband for more than 15 years, writing books on a wide range of topics, most connected with home decoration and improvement.

Five years ago, the events of 11 September 2001 effectively put an end to this business. “We were very involved with one big publisher whose books were aimed at the US market,” explains Sally. “But that year, no-one went to the Frankfurt Book Fair. The US market turned in on itself. So I had to find something else to do.”

This time coincided with Sally’s own feeling that for 20 years she’d been giving people ideas about interesting things to make and do and it was now time for her to do something for herself that she was interested in.

One of the books she had written was called Eco Deco and looked at how to created stylish items for the home from recycled materials. “I did a lot of research for the book into recycling and got very enthusiastic,” explains Sally. “So then it all came together. I knew I wanted to start a business where I was physically making something, and that could build on my existing knowledge of ecology and recycling.”

Initially, Sally sold her first few bags to local businesses, including a friend who opened a local store. She then approached her local enterprise agency, 1066 Enterprise, mainly to get advice about funding her business.

As a result, Sally went on a six-month, Learning and Skills Council NES programme. “I hadn’t thought of going on a course; I just wanted some money,” she comments. “But the agency convinced me that it would be helpful and in fact I thoroughly enjoyed the course. I completed changed my attitude and I found it very empowering.”

One of the aspects of the course that helped Sally take a more focused approach to her fledgling business was the computer studies. “We had to look at spreadsheets, which I had dealt with before, but very much on the creative side,” she says.

The course finished in February 2006 and Sally then began test trading until June. The cost of the course was free, and Sally also got £1,500 towards setting up her business, which she used to buy business stationery and towards the cost of her website (www.carry-a-bag.com).

“For the website, I used Republica Design, who were also just starting out, and my training as a designer really helped in clarifying my ideas about the website,” says Sally.

Sally invested the rest of the money in buying two second-hand but reliable sewing machines and her first rolls of fabric.

Sally has a modern approach to marketing, based on personal networking. Her four children have jobs in the fashion and media worlds, and this has given Sally a highly useful set of contacts to whom to market her products. “My eldest son is a creative director and all his friends work in the area of product promotion or fashion styling, she explains. “I realised it’s a pretty small world. I realised I knew a lot of these people and could send them a bag or information about the bags.” In addition, Sally’s husband is an artist who draws musicians, so Sally also has contacts in the musical world, and has promoted her products to them.

Targeting media professionals, as well as those in the fashion and music business, has proved a highly-effective a way of promoting Sally’s brand into her potential customer base. “My marketing strategy is entirely based on promoting my products to everyone I know and to everyone my children know in London and the media,” she explains.

“The first thing was a piece in Country Living magazine and I could not believe how much came out of that,” she comments. “From the moment the article appeared, things just went ballistic. It was fantastic. And that is exactly the customer I’m aiming at. I’m thinking of the Country Living woman and the young fashionable local shopper, in trendy places, like East Dulwich. I’m very clear about who my customers are. We were asked on the course to identify our ideal customer and mine was Jamie Oliver’s wife, Jools.”

The initial publicity has been followed by several more articles, including one in the Saturday Telegraph, and more are in the pipeline.

This has provided Sally with an excellent start for her business and she has learned the value of flexibility. “The business plan is more or less on track, but some goals have changed a bit,” she says. Originally, Sally planned to move the manufacturing of the bags out of the country, as the business expanded, but she has now decided they will be made locally. “I don’t want that sort of business,” she says. “I want the hands-on feel. I will be employing local people and I may set up a workshop.”

Sally’s biggest challenge has been staying focused on her primary goals for the business, rather than getting distracted into other projects. Within five years, she would like to have a concession within a major upmarket department store in this country and possibly in New York.

“I keep on planting the seeds,” she says. “I haven’t focused on trying to make money before, but now I am enjoying this challenge. It has been a huge change, from researching and writing books to running a business. Now that I’ve started, I would like it to be successful and being quite wealthy would also be nice!”

Microsoft Office Live is a free, ad-supported service that gives you a web site with your choice of domain name (e.g. www.examplefirm.com), a set of matching e-mail addresses and tools to manage customer contacts and existing documents. The UK version launches in “beta” (public test) mode on 15 Nov 06, the same day the US version completes testing and goes fully live. Microsoft has said the UK version will remain free once testing completes, with the revenue to run it coming from advertising.

More details at ZD Net UK

Good tips about writing press releases, as well as a straightforward press release generation tool. Fill in the boxes on the form and get a press release out.

The site www.samplepressrelease.info is registered in Switzerland but the English is quite good.

On October 28, 1906, around 50 people died when a train fell off a bridge in Pennsylvania. The railroad responded by issuing probably the world’s first press release - and by putting on a special train to help reporters get to the scene. Modern PR was born.

Read more on the railroad’s PR man Ivy Ledbetter Lee, whose career perfectly exemplifies both the good and bad side of PR.

There’s a surge in demand for environmentally friendly products as consumers respond to predictions of doom, according to this BBC report. “British shoppers increasingly look to shop with a clear conscience,” research firm Mintel says. The trend is strongest among people with more money.