Start-ups are not new. They’ve existed for years. And a couple of generations back, people would sell dog food in pet shops and sell used shampoo and so on.
But they always seemed to fail because they had one issue. They were big – it’s not easy to start selling something. And then you have to pay a marketing team. And you have to get the distribution channels – people in supermarkets, or, if you’re a dog grooming company, a distribution channel in the UK. And even then, you still have a marketing team that has to buy advertising space, and you still have to invest more money to put out the product.
What made you think it would be easy to start a dog grooming business?
There are a couple of reasons why I think it would be worth doing. One is because it would be really easy for people to use. If they come to your shop with their dog and they find you’ve got a shampoo, you can go and go down to the back where you have a bucket there and put out a bottle of shampoo. The customer only has to pay if you have the shampoo and they use it every day.
It’s a free service, it’s all about the customer. If people are happy and they’re happy enough with the service they’re getting from your shop, it’s just a matter of keeping it going year on year as a business. If they’re not happy they could switch to another company, because they’re not getting the same benefits with that new company.
Then you can grow. You can grow your revenues and your margins. It’s a win-win situation. The only problem is that I thought once you’d got that up and running, it was worth doing in the UK but now I think it works anywhere.
How did you do that?
I started out as a private person, as a private consultant. And you need somebody to set the framework for you. I have a firm that does that for me, but no-one else knows how to do it.
So, in my case, you’ve got a firm that sets a framework for you but you also need a marketer, and someone who is prepared to step in and put all the pieces back together to make the whole look like a successful business.
So what are some of the things people should look for if they are interested in starting a business?
I think the main things that people should look
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