IF YOU’VE EVER had an idea for a new product or business, you’ll likely have wondered very early on, ‘but how can I actually make it happen?’
From developing a brand to managing finances, the prospect of starting or growing a business can be overwhelming – but this can be made easier with the help of your Local Enterprise Office.
This Local Enterprise Week, March 7 – 11, over 220 events are taking place in-person and online for small businesses, new businesses and potential businesses. There are also 12 online national ‘Spotlight’ events which are open to every business – wherever you’re based.
To give you a taste of how businesses have benefitted from working with their Local Enterprise Office, we spoke to the owners of three growing Irish companies about the biggest lesson they’ve learned so far. Read on to see what they had to say…
- Mailo Power, Monkey Cups
It was just a few months after Monkey Cups launched that the coronavirus pandemic struck, leaving founder Mailo Power wondering where her reusable cup business would go from there.
The brand’s initial market was the hospitality industry – but once the country went into lockdown and the hospitality industry effectively shut, Mailo had to think of another way to reach customers. “I was out for a run and I saw quite a lot of courier vans,” she recalls. “So I said, ‘well people are buying. What can we do to make our cups more appealing for actually purchasing?’”
Mailo dived into some research on why people purchase, and discovered that personalisation can be one of the key factors. It was this that changed Monkey Cup’s trajectory. With the help of funding from her Local Enterprise Office, Mailo worked with a developer to create a tool on the website which would allow people to design their own Monkey Cup. “That was a life-changer for us,” she says. “It meant that the cup went from just a product to something that somebody created.
“From then, we changed our messaging from not only reuse, but also customisation. In many ways, the changes that we made during the pandemic spearheaded where we are today.”
“Through working with my Local Enterprise Office, I had the capacity as a small company to reach out to mentors who have so much experience,” she says. “It’s so important to have a mentor, and to find out as much as you can about your product and the reasons behind your product.”
- Ciara and Rachel Howard, Howrad Studios
For sisters Ciara and Rachel Howard, lockdown turned their passion for design into a business. “We had our own personal design pages and we used to do commissions for people while we were in college, but then we saw print shops going viral on social media and thought ‘we could do that,’” says Ciara. “We decided to put our minds together and come up with our first print collection.”
Howrad Studios launched in January 2021 with 15 prints and a ‘Galentine’s Day’ card collection, which the sisters promoted on social media. “We had a lot of time to come up with our branding and make sure that we had a good visual look across our whole Instagram page before we launched,” says Ciara. “We built up our following base with mainly close friends and acquaintances, and they got a lot of people to follow us too.”
In a bid to promote the business more, the pair sent some of their designs to Irish influencers, who went on to share them with their larger audiences. From there, the brand’s Instagram following continued to grow and now stands at 13.5k.
“Never underestimate the power of social media,” says Rachel. “If we have a quiet day and we post on Instagram, we see a major sales increase compared to if we didn’t post anything. I don’t know where we’d be if we didn’t have an Instagram account. Engage with your followers and don’t be afraid to invest in equipment for good quality photos and lighting.”
After working from their kitchen table for the first few months, Ciara and Rachel received support from their Local Enterprise Office to run the business in a dedicated space. “We never expected things to take off as fast as they did,” says Ciara. “We were kind of relying on everyone being on their phones so much during lockdown, and it all went from there.”
- Gráinne Mullins, Grá Chocolates
Another business born out of lockdown, artisan confectionary brand Grá Chocolates came to life when pastry chef Gráinne Mullins lost her job due to the pandemic. “When all of the restaurants closed, my world was turned a little bit upside down,” she says. “One thing I decided to do to keep myself busy was to make hand-painted Easter eggs for all of my friends and family as a little pick me up.”
Gráinne shared her creations to Instagram, and was surprised to have people reaching out to her wanting to buy them. “I thought that maybe it could be a business, but maybe it never would. I decided I’d lose nothing from doing a business course and seeing where that went.” Gráinne reached out to her Local Enterprise Office, who suggested she do the Start Your Own Business course.
After completing the course, Gráinne spent three months creating her business plan, carrying out market research, getting samples, building stock and getting a website built. “The more I got into it, the more I saw that there was a market there,” she says.
And she was right: Grá Chocolates launched online in July 2020 and sold out in eight minutes. “I didn’t actually know if anyone would buy my boxes, and all of a sudden I felt that there was huge demand.”
Less than two years later, Grá Chocolates is stocked in Brown Thomas and has a staff of 14. This fast growth led Gráinne to learn the importance of pushing herself. “It does take a lot of hard work and pushing yourself, even when times seem really hard,” she says. “It’s also really important to have a strong team around you in order to be able to build on things and to be able to grow the business a bit further.”
Her final advice for budding entrepreneurs? “Be brave and to go for it.”
Find out what programmes and supports are the best fit for your business in 2022 this Local Enterprise Week, March 7 – 11. Book your place at one of more than 220 online and in-person Local Enterprise Week events today here. Local Enterprise Week is organised by the Local Enterprise Offices and supported by Enterprise Ireland, local authorities and the Government of Ireland.
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