Patricia Monney, director of Hemel Hempstead-based Aviela, explains why the business should win the innovation in funding category of the Guardian Small Business Showcase competition.
Aviela was registered in 2007 but only started active trading three years ago. At the time, I had come to the end of my contract working with an IT company, and my husband had been made redundant from his job. I was responsible for paying the mortgage and bills. At the end of my contract I only had £100 in savings.
The raw material I needed for my products were in Ghana and the amount of money needed to purchase an initial 30kgs was £1000. Then as fate will have it, my father in-law passed away. My husband borrowed money for tickets from his cousins so we could travel to Ghana for the funeral. I was aware that clothes and shoes from the UK were a hot sell in Ghana so I invested my £100 in clothes and shoes from Primark and took them with me. I was able to sell them for five times the original price and made £1,800.
I purchased my first 30kgs of raw material and shipped it to the UK. After making the first £100 of sales I reinvested in the clothes again to raise another £1,800 to further invest in the business.
Fortunately I found a job two years ago and in the last two years I have been putting a third of my salary into developing my products.
All entries which meet the competition criteria are published and our judging panel select a shortlist of the three for each category. Winners are announced at an awards ceremony in summer 2016.
