I was 16 when I first started, with no qualifications, no money, just a dream in my head, and I made every mistake in the book, and now I’ve started all over again. And I’ve made every mistake in the book. [Even with] age and experience, you still need to make mistakes. I always think that failure is the doorstep to success.
Jo Malone
The Apprentice, BBC One,
3 June 2012
I like being my own boss. I don’t respond well to authority and routine. I get bored very easily!
Sarah Hancox
SARAH WAS born in Australia to English parents. Her father’s job in computers meant that she moved back and forth between the two countries. At 17, while in London, she found work as an administrator in the City.
She needed to help pay off some debts that her boyfriend had incurred. So she began working at the Evening Standard during the day, and a restaurant in Putney in the evenings and at weekends. When the relationship eventually disintegrated and she left him, she discovered that she was looking forward to going to work at the restaurant – and making a lot of money in tips.
DREAM BUSINESS OWNER
Sarah Hancox
Vite.net.au, Adelaide, Australia
JOURNEY
Sales 
Founder of corporate catering company
“I didn’t want to go back to an office, so I went full-time at the restaurant. I was able to think about my own career for the first time in seven years. I was earning £150 a week and my rent was £115. But it’s amazing what you can do when you’re forced to. I decided to enroll in a Higher National Diploma (HND) in hospitality. It was a great course and I went on to do a top-up year and gained my BA Hons. It was fantastically resourced and the lecturers were full of enthusiasm. It taught me so much about food, but also about business – human resources management, basic accountancy, rotas, sales and marketing.
“Following the HND I got a job working as an operations manager in the City. During this time I met a lot of different and experienced people who had a great influence on me.”
Armed with her new training and experience, she went into business with her brother and they bought a restaurant. But Sarah soon began to feel the strains of a seven-day operation with a late licence. She enjoyed it less and less as drinking in the UK became more “full-on and aggressive” and the business became more and more about the bar. It lasted six years.
She married, and wanted to spend more time with her husband. They decided they couldn’t achieve that in the UK. A couple of holidays in Australia had made them fond of Adelaide. They saw its potential for a more laidback lifestyle. They took the plunge and moved to Oz.
“I was emotionally exhausted and in a broken-down state. I took six months out and eventually recovered and got a temping job. But the days dragged, so I went into real estate. I needed a change from the 24-hour responsibility of being self-employed. I worked in real estate for 18 months.
“Real estate in South Australia is run very much like having your own business. You provide the finance to market yourself, you arrange all your own appointments, you work on your own, and you sell the property. But the pay was commission-based and the stress of waiting for cash to come in made me realise that I might as well be genuinely self-employed again.”
“While in real estate I had started thinking about the food business again and as we became more familiar with Adelaide and the market, it seemed to become a real possibility.
“I started as a small stall in a food court within a shopping mall. I cooked in the morning and served the food, and it was all gone by lunchtime. It enabled me to have a really good look at how Adelaide worked, how it dressed, how much money people had. It was a great insight into the market. Without realising I was doing it, I was looking in the Businesses For Sale section in the paper and came across a very cheap food outlet in the city centre.
“We were sitting in the back garden one hot summer night, drinking a great bottle of South Australian wine, lamenting the fact that it was very hard to buy something other than Asian fast food for lunch in the city centre. I already knew what type of dishes people liked to buy from my experience in the restaurant and wondered if I could produce that type of food for the price that people were prepared to pay for lunch. My husband works in marketing and I have always been a believer in strong marketing. By the time we finished the bottle, we had a framework – the name, how the shopfront would look, the menu and what equipment would be needed, who the customers would be and how to reach them.”
“I sat every day for a week just watching what went on in the food court – when it was busy, who was purchasing, what they were purchasing, what they looked like, who was just walking through, where else they shopped.
“I then approached my bank. Having an appropriate qualification and lots of experience is always a good thing when talking to banks. And they definitely will want to see a business plan. Put everything into it – it doesn’t matter how trivial it may be.
“I spoke to all of my friends and associates who buy their lunch in the city and I ate at a lot of different outlets to see what the quality and pricing was like.
“I did approach a local business enterprise council but for some reason they were very unhelpful and told me that there wasn’t a market for what I wanted to do. True to my character, I ignored everything they said and pushed it to the back of my mind.
“I was offered a business loan and credit card by the bank. We did a soft opening and just let the clientele slowly increase over the first week, before launching into any advertising.
“I like being my own boss. I don’t respond well to authority and routine. I get bored very easily! My business has moved, from a food court stall to a café, then to catering for a conference centre, and now to catering for a corporate market. South Australia is very much a Monday-to-Friday society. I saw an opportunity to do what I love and still have weekends with my husband.”
“I did have a mentor, although I didn’t realise it until years later: my boss, when I was an operations manager. He was an accountant with a food background. He always faced difficult situations with humour, but he also taught me the importance of budget control when you’re dealing with food. He often made decisions that would confuse and frustrate me. But now, years later, I find myself doing and saying the things he did and said.
“Managing cash flow, and being undercapitalised – you can never have enough capital to start with and there will always be bills popping up that you didn’t account for.”
“This year, and just recently, it was being able to tender for catering contracts and get them. Last year – hitting my target for food cost, labour cost and turnover, all together in the same month! In the previous business – my restaurant in Hitchin was reviewed as one of Britain’s most authentic restaurants. I wasn’t even in the country! I was very proud of my staff, who maintained their high standards and customer service when the boss wasn’t around.
“And above everything else, seeing my staff happy at work and enjoying their own successes.”
“Have more money to start off with! And make sure to always have some capital in the bank.
“In the early days I should have tried not to do everything myself and to delegate a bit more. Try to relax and enjoy the process.”
“I like Veuve Clicquot – besides being a yummy champagne, they have a consistent, international brand that inspires people to buy. Yet when you go to Champagne the grapes used are grown and farmed by many small families, still using traditional methods.”
“Yes, people are not spending as much. However, there is less competition because catering businesses close. You simply have to focus on things like customer service, value and quality.”
“It isn’t necessary. For me it’s all about personal contact and attention. I have friends who have their own businesses and they just seem to spend all their time updating, reading, freaking out about negative responses, and not doing what they do best – which is running their business. I join networking forums and make business contacts that way. People remember you, and your reputation spreads through word of mouth. Once you work for a client and do a good job, they don’t go elsewhere.”
Sarah’s Secrets
TO DREAM BUSINESS SUCCESS
1 Know your industry, take time to learn your trade.
2 Be honest with yourself about what your customers want. Watch what they do – not what they say!
3 Be prepared for a 24/7 commitment.
4 Continue to actively market your business, especially in the downtime.
5 Understand that you are only as good as your staff and that they are your biggest asset.
6 Go out of your way for your customers.
Goals are like the stepping stones that will take you to your vision. We need short-, medium- and long-term goals to move us along, to have something to aspire to and to act as landmarks in our business success. You might want to think about a monthly goal, a goal for three months’ time and one for a year from now.
Your goals may change as your business evolves and that’s OK too. The main thing is to get clarity as to what it is you’re aiming for.
• Turnover for the business
• Customer/client numbers
• Client retention
• Costs of running the business
• Repeat orders
• Profitability
• Personal drawing from the business – how many business owners forget to draw a salary?
• Placement in marketplace
• Reputation and brand awareness
• Possibility of expansion
Don’t forget to think about personal goals, too. It is important to remember all aspects of your life, not just your business in isolation, in order to have the perfect work-life balance. After all, there would be no victory and joy in creating a successful business if it came at an irretrievable cost to your family, relationships or health.
• Starting a new and absorbing hobby
• Having time to exercise, play sports, keep fit
• Enjoying quality time with family and friends
• Going for regular salon treatments
• Taking more mini holidays or weekend breaks
• Making financial investments, such as in property or stocks
• Looking good and dressing well
• Eating healthy organic foods and drinking lots of water
• Giving up toxic habits – smoking, drinking alcohol to excess, too much coffee, fast foods, etc
• Getting more sleep
A goal should be:
Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Realistic
Timely
Write down your goals and put them some place you can see them regularly. Imagine the thrill as you reach your goal and then set another even more exciting one. Use your goals to keep you motivated and inspired.
If the thought of competition has you thinking back to the horrors of the school sports day, knees knocking in your gym shorts and heart pounding as all the leaner, meaner, faster kids flexed their muscles next to you at the starting line, then relax.
Everyone needs competition. It keeps us sharp and gives us an edge that can help define our businesses. Accept the fact that competition will never go away. It’s as much a part of your success as your client base.
There is no point adopting an ostrich approach to competition. It won’t serve you to ignore what other people are doing. Regularly review the competition so you can ‘up’ your offer, check the market value of your service, get new ideas, create further niches and update your message.
If you are feeling threatened by your competitors, you are coming from a point of neediness, and fear is never an attractive message to send out to your clients or customers. Try instead to come from a position of abundance – there is plenty to go around, provided you are secure in what you do and the unique services you offer.
Competition never goes away, no matter how much you may wish it. There will always be a new kid on the block offering something different. Your success depends on how you roll with the changes and move with the tide. Don’t ignore fashion changes or badmouth them to clients and customers – it will all backfire on you.
The danger with competition is to obsess so much about it that you get bogged down with what others are doing while not paying attention to your own business. Keep competition in perspective. In fact, why not go a step further and embrace your competitors?
Strategic Alliance Partnerships (SAPs) could help you increase your business and develop further niches. Go and meet people who do what you do and find out how they do business, create support and referral groups, discuss how you work differently and see how you can dovetail your services.
Why not offer to share website addresses on your websites or refer other people in your profession if you are unable to handle the business?
For example, coaches could form SAPs with other coaches, psychotherapists, hypnotherapists, personal trainers, beauty salons, gyms, counsellors, business groups, alternative healers, schools, women’s groups, etc.
What SAPs could you create? Don’t be afraid to go and see your main competitor. Perhaps you could support each other in more ways than you think.