TWO years ago, when Sir Richard Branson told his employees they could have unlimited holidays, Jenny Biggam smiled to herself — her workers had been enjoying that perk for almost a decade.
At Biggam’s media agency, The7stars, staff take holidays whenever they want and for as long as they please. Why? Because they answer to nobody.
“I’m all about people realising their potential in a lateral way and not moving up the career ladder rung by rung,” said Biggam, 49, who started her agency in 2005. It buys media space and measures advertising campaigns for the likes of fashion chain Jigsaw, Virgin EMI Records and betting business Gala Coral.
Biggam said her flat structure cuts red tape and boosts creativity. Placing such trust in her 140 staff means they are less likely to abuse the system, she claimed. Last week, for the fourth year in a row, her brainchild was named one of The Sunday Times top five best small companies to work for.
“We don’t have people leaving to work for other media agencies. They either leave to set up their own businesses, change career or go travelling,” said Biggam.
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With co-founders Mark Jarvis and Colin Mills, Biggam has expanded the agency to sales of more than £140m and profits of £1.2m. Revenues are expected to hit £220m in the financial year ending this month. The central London company has grown 30% year-on-year for three years.
Steady growth and profits have attracted bids from large companies, but the founder is not interested. “We have had some approaches, but we are committed to staying independent. We politely declined.” Biggam owns about 40% of the business.
It hasn’t been plain sailing. Early on, The7stars struggled to win pitches and clients. “It’s hard when you don’t have the scale and volume your competitors do, but you have to pick yourself up, dust yourself down and get ready for the next one,” she said.
Risk-taking is key, she added. “Accountants would always tell us ‘cash is king’, don’t overstretch yourself and don’t reinvest, but if you don’t plan for a certain amount of success, you won’t have any success.”
Biggam, the “difficult middle child”, was born in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, and raised in Hertfordshire. Her mother was a primary school teacher and her father an accountant. She went to St Albans Girls’ School and sold sweets in a shop for pocket money. After A-levels she shunned higher education. “I was quite stubbornly against going to university. It was a route I didn’t want to go down.”
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Somebody at school told her that, without a degree, she could forge a career only in retailing or advertising. Biggam then landed a job at a small marketing agency in London’s Soho. “I started off making tea and coffee, trying to learn the ropes.”
After three years she left to join Zenith Media as a trainee media buyer, moving up to become group manager during her six years at the company.
She then moved to manage the buying of television ads at London media agency Carat, where she met Jarvis and Mills. “I didn’t have a big career plan, but I had great bosses who spotted some potential and I moved up quite quickly to some senior positions,” she said.
In 2005, Biggam turned her back on corporate life after 20 years of working for media agencies — to set up her own. “The initial feeling, apart from fear and blind panic, was one of liberation. I wanted to bottle that feeling.”
She teamed up with Jarvis and Mills to start The7stars, named after the London pub where the idea was born. A year later Gareth Jones, who had worked with Biggam at Carat, joined as a partner. The venture was founded with savings and an undisclosed amount from an angel investor, whom they bought out four years later.
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“Most media planning and buying was focused on big clients with million-pound budgets,” said Biggam. “There were smaller clients who needed to be better looked after and deserved a different type of agency.”
The7stars has long outgrown its original offices, having to relocate four times within a decade.
Biggam, too, has had to change with the times. Ten years ago, television and print media brought in most of her business; today Twitter and Facebook play a huge part in clients’ briefs.
Because each year brings new digital platforms and social media challenges with it, every 12 months Biggam sits down with her co-founders to write a new plan for The7stars.
“Digital media have changed the shape of a media agency in a way we would never ever have anticipated,” she said. “We had to be really dynamic in how we set our target.” She believes that staying independent has helped her to attract business.
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Biggam lives with her husband Tim, 53, in Islington, north London. Her advice for those wanting to start a business is to take time first to nail the concept.
“You get a one-off chance to sit down with a blank piece of paper and think about what type of company you want to create. I’d urge anyone looking to set up a business to take that time out.” She added: “Respect your team, because nobody does this on their own.”