He’s a great business mentor
When Valérie Aelbrecht had the opportunity to run a pop-up store at Old Street station last summer, she grabbed it with both hands. It was only later that she realised how much work it would be as a sole founder.
“I set up ProToGo a year ago,” she says. “And I started off in markets, such as Spitalfields and Finsbury Square [in London], as well as selling online. [The market stall] was great – I was really close to the customers and they were giving me great feedback. It allowed me to test the concept.”
Aelbrecht recruited two interns to help her over the two-week period she’d have the pop-up store and called her dad Francis for advice. His response surprised her.
“He said: ‘Val, I’m booking my plane ticket now,” she says. “It was incredible. He’s 58, works in banking and has never cooked anything in his life. Before he came to London, he practised knife skills and chopping vegetables with my mum. They sent me pictures to check the peppers were sliced finely enough.”
Aelbrecht had been working as a model and studying in London when she decided to start ProToGo – she’d struggled to find healthy meals that also filled her up. She says her dad has always been supportive of her ambition to run her own business and having him on her pop-up shop team has only strengthened her resolve to make a success of it.
And how were his chopping skills on the day? “I think he underestimated the work involved,” she says. “We cooked for the entire night, then had two hours’ sleep, and were back in the store by 6am. Every evening, we would sit with a glass of wine and make a summary of the day and ask what we learned and what we could do better.
“He’s a great business mentor. I think the best advice he’s given me is you have to be patient sometimes. I’m always very impatient, I want to go faster, better and harder. He reminds me to take it step by step – you cannot run before you can walk.”
He lent us £10,000 to pay the manufacturer
Founder of social enterprise Stand4 Socks, Josh Turner, says his dad would rather he had “a normal job”.
“I think he’d rather this was a fun side project, rather than being what I do full time,” he adds. “He does ask when the business is going to start making some proper money, but when talking to friends and family, he’s always very proud of what I’m doing.”
Turner launched the Manchester-based business almost two years ago with an ambition to change the world. Money made from each pair of his bamboo, cotton and sport socks support a United Nations global goal, such as planting trees, providing vaccinations, or clearing landmines.
The business has expanded its range recently, launching three new styles in time for Christmas 2016. Turner says this involved placing a larger order than they ever had before, and led to a cashflow issue when the bill arrived.
“Our manufacturer in Turkey is great and really flexible but obviously they did want to be paid at some point. We were £10,000 short and my dad lent us the money. Luckily we were able to pay him back after Christmas.”
Turner adds that while his dad Richard has offered financial support before, he’s always been reluctant to take it. “Running a business is high risk, so I didn’t feel very comfortable [accepting his offer]. He’s helped me enough on a personal level, without him having to help the business as well. But all small businesses have cashflow problems, especially when you’re trying to grow and it’s not always easy to get a bank to lend you the money.”
His dad also allows the team to keep stock in his flat and Turner admits there are Ikea storage boxes stacked eight high in the living room. “We call it our fulfilment HQ. There are socks everywhere,” he says.
I got my work ethic from my dad
Rod Garnham was always greatly influenced by his father when it came to his career. After leaving school, Garnham became an engineer just like his dad, Stephen, having spent his childhood watching his father at work. “He gave me a work ethic,” he says.
Garnham co-founded his Cambridgeshire-based brand, Corkers Crisps, along with his friend Ross Taylor in 2010. His father was retired at the time but happily pitched in to help as Garnham tried to get the business off the ground, doing everything from helping out financially to selling the crisps and attending trade shows. “He picked me up and carried me through,” says Garnham. “You could go and talk to him about anything.”
At one point in the early days, Garnham had no one to deliver the crisps to his customers. As the phone calls started coming in from angry customers waiting for their orders, his dad hopped in a van and delivered the crisps to local cafes and shops. “He did really well at it,” says Garnham, recalling with some amusement that his dad also enjoyed a cake or a cup of coffee at almost every café he delivered to. His dad went on to became a part-time delivery driver for Corkers for a couple of years. He was also part of the crew when Corkers created a bag of crisps as tall as a house in 2013 to break the world record for the largest bag of crisps.
Now Corkers Crisps employs 80 people and the brand is stocked in Waitrose, as well as by easyJet and British Airways and is launching in Harrods this weekend. Stephen takes more of back seat now but still has a keen interest in the business. “I learned the value of patience and hard work from my father,” Garnham says. “This business has brought us closer together than ever.”
