Material girl talks shop
Interior design superstar Kelly Hoppen has a word of advice for budding entrepreneurs: don’t plough your own cash into starting up a business.
"People think you need thousands of millions of pounds to set up your own company," she says. "That’s a complete fallacy.”
Hoppen, who designs interiors for wealthy private clients, publishes homeware books and has a product range in Bhs, got her first commission as a designer when she was just 16: “My stepfather’s friend wanted his kitchen done and I said, ‘I’ll do it’. It sounds absurd but that’s the truth.
"Things just grew from there. I didn’t go to college. I was the worst mathematician at school. I’m dyslexic. And yet I now run a multi-million pound interior design business.”
“It just shows that nothing is impossible,” she says.
“Starting a business isn’t about getting investment; it’s about coming up with a really brilliant idea and working out how you can make money without any upfront costs.
"If somebody wanted to start an interior design business tomorrow, all they need is a telephone. If they’re clever, they’ll get a deposit of half the amount before they start designing.”
Impressively, Hoppen has built her £18m-turnover business without a penny of outside equity investment.
“We’ve occasionally had to borrow very small amounts from the bank,” she admits. “After 9/11, for example, the business really suffered and it took us a couple of years to get back on track.”
But she’s scathing about the attitude of big banks to SMEs: “Banks could be a lot more accommodating when it comes to helping businesses. I think all the advertising they do on television is a lot of shit, actually.”
Read a full interview with Kelly Hoppen in the October edition of Real Business magazine.
Visit www.kellyhoppen.com.
Bee Says:
I agree with what Kelly says about banks. In my experience, banks could do a lot more when you starting up your business. It would make the whole process that little bit less scary!