 Where did the idea for your business come from? It came from the realisation and frustration that platforms like Amazon were not considering the impact they were having on the planet, the packaging they use, how the products are made, who makes them and at what cost in both human and planet terms. So the idea to create a platform where all products and businesses listing have a shared set of values, that the products are ethically made and sourced, that they have minimal impact on the planet and are sustainable and that they are vegan or come from a vegan range. This also means they are aligned with Choose Conscious as a business. This provides consumers with an alternative. Interestingly recently like many companies Amazon are having a really good go at green washing themselves, any improvements are important and should be applauded but consumers need to look beyond the surface. What's a typical day like? No day is the same, I like many founders have to wear many hats, so anything from social media planning, to contacting new business to discuss listing on the platform, to bookkeeping and so on! What is the best part of having your own business? The flexibility around the working day, work life balance, the freedom to create the business I want. Creating a business for good. Working with sellers that are likeminded. What's the hardest part? Always making all the decisions, decision fatigue is real!  What’s your bestselling product? There is a wonderful array of different vendors listed on the site, from toilet brushes to Vegan Leather trousers but the best seller this month has been a Vegan Candle range. If you had one piece of advice for someone just starting out, what would it be? Do your market research and always listen to your gut, oops that’s two! Let's talk tech. Which software do you use in your business? ( Online store, email marketing, scheduling tools, video apps, accounting & banking apps etc) If you're on Shopify, I'd also love to learn your favourite apps. I use Dokan and WooCommerce, Xero for accounting, Stripe, Mailchimp, HubSpot for CRM, Canva and Sprout Social. I’m always looking for anything that can help automate a process, so I have more time to actually run the business.  Which social media platform works best for you?
Instagram, along with Instagram shop. What business book/podcast/courses would you recommend? I’ve not read a business book recently, I should make time, the last one was Freakonomics probably 15 years ago! In terms of courses I’ve also not done any for years but if you are considering it remember how valuable your time is and invest only courses that fill in your skills gaps. Where can people find you? www.chooseconscious.com
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 Where did the idea for your business come from? Tell us how and why you get started. I have always loved stationery and could never walk past a stationery shop so when I left my previous career with redundancy (thankfully) I decided to do a start your own business course with a stationery shop in mind and that was it. It is also a little bit different as I personalise some of the stationery too (pencils & notebooks) and I have my own Fold & Seal range What's a typical day like? It’s a real mix between packing orders, emails, PR and then once my two children are home from school it’s homework, dinner, usual family life and then a little bit of work in the evening when they go to bed.  What is the best part of having your own business? Making decisions, getting good customer feedback and working to my own timetable What's the hardest part? Making decisions and sometimes the responsibility of delivering good quality products that customers will be happy with. What’s your best selling product? Definitely the Personalised Pencils & Notebooks – I personalise using my hot foil printing press, customers love this.  If you had one piece of advice for someone just starting out, what would it be? Engage with your audience as much as you can Let's talk tech. Which softwares do you use in your business? ( Online store, email marketing, scheduling tools, video apps, accounting & banking apps etc)If you're on Shopify, I'd also love to learn your favourite apps. My website is Wordpress, I use Storycutter for my IG stories and Mailchimp for my Newsletter. Which social media platform works best for you? Instagram  What business book/podcast/courses would you recommend? I’m terrible I don’t read any business books … but I do listen to podcasts , my favourites include The Futurist with Jo Linehen , Let’s Talk Shop with Therese from the Small Business Collaborative and most recently I have started to listen to Work, Actually with Kate Chaundy
I am also the Community Manager for REALWORK which is the online co-working space for Women, founded by Fleur Emery. This is not a course but I absolutely recommend being part of it if you are a female founder or business owner. Where can people find you? www.foldandseal.ie @foldandseal hello@foldandseal.ie  Where did the idea for your business come from? Tell us how and why you get started. Our first product Wylde One was in the making for over a decade, ever since I was training as a medical herbalist. At the training clinic we kept seeing young women getting intimate irritations after sex, and this was making them feel awkward with their partners and out of touch with their bodies. This was when I first got the idea that I wanted to create something completely natural with top-notch ingredients that would make sex more enjoyable and less likely to cause irritation, whilst allowing them to feel that they were looking after themselves and their bodies’ needs. It was really important to me to create something that made women feel good when they bought and used it, from the design of the packaging to the quality of the ingredients and the information we provided, and so Wylde One was born.  What's a typical day like? During lockdown, the typical day looks like getting up at 7am for some exercise and meditation, breakfast and shower, ready to be at my desk for 9am. I’ll work through, but breaking for lunch and often do live events in the early evening. I find if I turn my computer on before 9 I can find myself enticed to start work before I’veeaten breakfast, so that’s a habit I’m in the middle of breaking! Postlockdown I am looking forward to getting back to face to face meetings again. I’m a real people person and nothing beats making plans with a collaborator in real life! What is the best part of having your own business? I get to make all the decisions and decide on the direction we’re going in. I love that freedom!! What's the hardest part? The buck stops with me! Also, I can’t wait to work with a team again!  What’s your best selling product?
At this point we just have our award-winning product Wylde One. Wylde One, is a luxurious, certified vegan and organic botanical water-based lubricant ,designed to be actively beneficial for a healthy intimate environment. Made from five dynamic botanicals, it has an intimately balanced pH, is 100% plant based,and has a ‘body identical’ feel so you can connect with confidence, even when your climate down under isn’t wyldly happy. What’s more, it’s condom-safe and nasties-free so now you can get down and dirty, safe in the knowledge that your lubricant is 100% clean. If you had one piece of advice for someone just starting out, what would it be? Research, research, research, before you commit your precious funds. You will make mistakes but better that they are mistakes in the right direction and you can learn valuable, relevant information about your sector or yourself that will stand you in good stead for the future! Let's talk tech. Which softwares do you use in your business? ( Online store, email marketing, scheduling tools, video apps, accounting & banking apps etc) If you're on Shopify, I'd also love to learn your favourite apps. Currently we’re on Wordpress, Woocommerce and use Mailchimp, which are all great! I’m a big fan of Canva too! It has saved us on many occasions! Which social media platform works best for you? We’ve found that we get the most interaction on Instagram which is a space I personally love anyway. I love how visual it is and the sense of community on there - we’ve made so many good connections there that have gone on to be friends - its a very supportive platform! What business book/podcast/courses would you recommend? I’ve always dipped in and out of podcasts and courses and taken the bits from them that I need, but I’ve really loved the work of Marie Forleo and Denise Duffield Thomas. They totally inspired me in the early days of researching my set-up for Into the Wylde. I also really like the work of Amanda Cook too - she specialises in helping Wellness Entrepreneurs position themselves and sort out their messaging. Her work rocks! Where can people find you? www.intothewylde.com IG: @intothewylde FB: @IntoTheWylde We can’t wait to meet you!!  Where did the idea for your business come from? Tell us how and why you get started. My Grandad was a hobbying poet and wrote stacks of poems for me when I was a little girl. I rediscovered his words when I was clearing out my Mum’s loft after she passed away and being pregnant at the time I had an overwhelming feeling of nostalgia and happiness remembering my childhood. I not only wanted to share his words with my new baby but thought it might bring some joy and much needed escape to other people as well. My day job had been proving more and more challenging so I needed a light relief and a new focus and during Covid work wasn’t going so well so I had a bit more time and determination to get Nettlefold up and running. Nettlefold was the name of my childhood home that I had to sell when I lost Mum. What's a typical day like? Sadly Nettlefold has to come after the day job and looking after my baby boy so it tends to be post 7pm that I get cracking with Nettlefold. Then when my other half is off work I find myself packing cards in the spare room!  What is the best part of having your own business? The freedom to go at my own pace, on my own terms and take it in whichever direction I want. What's the hardest part? The fact I want to do nothing but Nettlefold and focus on it 100% but am unable to due to the day job! Also the guilt with the Mum/work juggle What’s your best selling product? The Animal Friends greeting cards but I’ve just released a new sunflower design that is proving very popular so that may take over! If you had one piece of advice for someone just starting out, what would it be? Take it slowly, don’t make any rash decisions to ‘get it out there’ and don’t be afraid to ask for help and advice. Let's talk tech. Which softwares do you use in your business? ( Online store, email marketing, scheduling tools, video apps, accounting & banking apps etc)If you're on Shopify, I'd also love to learn your favourite apps. Wix for my website, GoDaddy for the site and Email domain hosting,Mailchimp for email marketing. Planoly for Instagram and Canva for drafting templates for flyers/ads/IG posts etc  Which social media platform works best for you?
Instagram has been slow but starting to get traction now What business book/podcast/courses would you recommend? The Resiliant Retail Club is amazing Where can people find you? www.nettlefoldhome.co.uk IG @nettlefoldhome FB facebook.com/nettlefoldhome  I am super excited to launch a new series of blogs where I interview successful e-commerce founders. This week we have the lovely Anushi Desai, co-founder of Plant Pops Snacks. Where did the idea for your business come from? Tell us how and why you get started. I’ve always been a foodie but I came up with the idea for Plant Pops after making popped lotus seeds at home (just like my grandmother and mother did) with some interesting flavour combinations and taking them into work for my colleagues. We used to work long hours and snack all the time, getting really bored of crisps and popcorn which is all that seemed to be on offer. Everyone loved the popped lotus seeds and that’s when we knew we were onto a winner! My friend Ash was the first to get hooked and he’s co-founder of our brand. We must have tested around 15 different flavours across hundreds of people to get to our starting line up of Himalayan Salt, Smoked Chilli and Peanut Butter Popped Lotus Seeds. Our mission is always to create snacks that are good for you, good for the environment and good for the communities that create them. Every pack sold helps us support Action Village India, a charity that supports farmers and their families in Northern India, from where we source our popped lotus seeds. What's a typical day like? Fortunately there’s no typical day! Although I’m working from home a lot more now, as are a lot of people, my day is super varied. I tend to focus on operations and products earlier in the day so I can liaise with our manufacturers. There’s lots of moving parts to look after so there really isn’t any typical day!  What is the best part of having your own business? I love being able to create something from scratch and see people enjoy it! I also love how flexible we can be and think of an idea, and put it into action within a couple of hours. One of my favourite things is sampling with our customers - I love hearing what they think, seeing them try a popped lotus seed for the first time and getting their thoughts on what they'd like us to bring out next. What's the hardest part? Sometimes running your own business can be a bit overwhelming - you've got so many different hats on that you have to upskill pretty quickly to make sure you're doing the right thing for the business at the right time. It can at times also be a bit lonely - running a start up in particular has some incredibly high highs and some really low lows. Every sale feels so great, but there are some challenges along the way too.  What’s your best selling product?
It really varies by platform – but our Peanut Butter is very unusual and our customers absolutely love it! If you had one piece of advice for someone just starting out, what would it be? I wish I’d been braver at the beginning - I second guessed myself a lot, and toyed with the idea of going forward with the business for at least 6 months. I wish I'd had the confidence in my idea and gone for it earlier. If you have an idea, you've tested the product-market fit, I would say just go for it! You'll never know until you try! Let's talk tech. Which softwares do you use in your business? ( Online store, email marketing, scheduling tools, video apps, accounting & banking apps etc). If you're on Shopify, I'd also love to learn your favourite apps. I use Notion pretty much ALL the time – I use it to make lists, track our stockists, sales, website updates and pretty much everything else through it. Later is great for scheduling content across our social media channels. I use FreeAgent for accounting and invoicing and all the boring bits! Which social media platform works best for you? Instagram is great to share visuals and really communicate with our audience. What business book/podcast/courses would you recommend? I love podcasts – some of my favourite business podcasts are PitchDeck and How I Built This. Where can people find you? You can find our Plant Pops through our website www.plantpopssnacks.com, Amazon and lots of great independent stores! |
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