on in the background.
“What they say about being an
entrepreneur is it’s not a part-time job,
it’s not a full-time job – it’s a lifestyle,”
she says. “You live and breathe it and
when it’s your own job you’re working
at it all the time. But it’s your job, your
life and you are working towards your
dream. And for a lot of people, that’s
what they want. You don’t get much
rest; you work harder than someone
who is employed.”
Most mums find it difficult to
balance a career and parenting.
Annabel’s advice is to “find your own
guilt threshold, and to work when the
children are asleep.”
“Having children is not the full stop
at the end of your CV,” she insists.
“You can still work. It doesn’t have to
be full-time. My business started off
like a cottage industry. I could write
a book, be with the children, take
them to their playgroups. I had some
balance. It became more full-time
when they went to school and I had
more time, but I built the foundations
of the business when they were little
and it grew from there.”
Success stories
As well as sharing her own incredible
story,
Mumpreneur
offers the combined
wisdom of some of the UK’s most
successful women, including Chrissie
Rucker MBE, founder of The White
Company, Thomasina Miers of
hit Mexican food chain Wahaca,
Jacqueline Gold of Ann Summers, and
Nails Inc founder Thea Green, all of
whom tell their own stories of setting
up businesses as mums.
“Chrissie Rucker, who has four
children, set up the White Company
because she met a guy and wanted to
prove she was good wife material,”
Annabel says. “So she decided to
do up his house completely in white.
She couldn’t find any good white
materials but eventually found all the
people who make the white products
for Ralph Lauren and she found that
she could get them for one-third of
the price. So she started a mail-order
company. It all started from that. She
went stratospheric. Twenty years later
and the company is an international
success story. You have to do whatever
you want to do and that fits with you.”
After children, women can feel
like they have lost their identity,
confidence, time and dreams. Annabel
is adamant that all she wants is for
women to feel fulfilled instead of
frustrated with their lives. She comes
across as a strong feminist, fighting
the good fight and defending the
sisterhood. “Most women are very
clever but they don’t realise how clever
they are. They can deal with a toddler
having a tantrum, which means
they’ve got incredible people skills,
they can organise three children’s
diaries, which means they have
incredible organisation skills, and all
these things are good in business. So,
sometimes you have to get a life coach
to realise the experience you have to
give you that confidence!”
Getting started
So how should women who are
frustrated go about taking the bull
by the horns and starting their own
business? Can anyone do it? And what
about those with no spare cash to
invest and no real relevant experience?
While some people do start with
nothing, Annabel doesn’t advise
staking your house on it. The most
vital ingredients for a successful
mumpreneur are “confidence and
passion and drive... and you’ve got to
do something you love”.
There have been many barriers
to women starting and running
businesses in the past, but it seems that
we are having a bit of a heyday with
more and more women taking the leap.
The main hurdles Annabel identifies
are trying to be a perfectionist and
being too risk-averse.
“You can try for perfection but
sometimes you’ve just got to get it
done,” explains Annabel. “You don’t
need to wait for the perfect time to
start something because that might
not come.” When it comes to fear,
Annabel unapologetically exclaims
that “confidence is as important as
competence. An entrepreneur won’t be
afraid of trying something and failing
because they know that by failing they
will learn something and that’s life.
I think James Dyson invented 5,126
vacuums before he got to the one he
invented.”
To start a business, you need to
come up with an idea; the service,
product or experience you are going
to provide. “Very often the idea is so
simple,” she says. “You might even
think ‘This is too simple – I can’t do
it!’ But simple is good.” Once you have
decided on a simple idea that involves
something you love, and have built up
the courage to take the plunge, you
need to do your research.
“If you want to open a café
here”, she explains, looking around
the Pacific Place coffee shop we’re
chatting in, “the first thing I would say
is to come and sit here for an entire
day. You need to experience it, watch
it and observe it. You need to know
who is coming, when they are coming,
what profit is being made, what costs
are involved. You can’t do all your
research behind a desk.”
Living in the technologically
enabling world that we do, more
women than ever can build a business
with bottle and babe in arms. And that
is not just great for mums, but for their
children and their husbands, too.
“Live your dream, whatever that
dream might be,” she says, before
dashing off for an afternoon of
interviews and book signings. This
busy Mumpreneur clearly doesn’t sit
still for long before she is on to the next
project.
Mumpreneur
is available now
from Amazon.
May 2015
57
