ALEX DEPLEDGE is not your typical female entrepreneur. Four years ago she started hassle.com, which lets users contact vetted local cleaners who are paid through an online system.
Since then, the 34-year-old has raised almost £4m of investment from high-profile backers and built a team of more than 60 at her west London offices. In July, she sold her company for a reported £26m. Now, it’s important she tells other women that they can do it too.
“If it wasn’t for other female chief executives telling me it’s doable, I might have started thinking I couldn’t do it,” said Depledge, who sold out to Berlin-based competitor Helpling and is still chief executive at Hassle.
Since she started the business with friends Tom Nimmo and female coder Jules Coleman, she has become all too aware of the confidence issues cited by many female entrepreneurs. Research from Barclays suggests that women can struggle to raise capital and that they face more barriers to growth than their male counterparts. According to its study, women lead just 19% of the country’s small and medium-sized companies.
“The statistics tell you everything you need to know and there are simply not as many women starting and succeeding in business,” said Depledge. “At the start, we kicked around a few ideas, hit on one we thought was good, and did what was necessary to make it work. We didn’t ask ourselves whether it was OK that we were doing this.”
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Overcoming confidence issues altogether could be difficult, but according to Depledge, there is a way around the problem.
“I think it’s about knowing that you might not be as confident as other people but knowing that you have to fake it,” she said.
“What worries me is that when women do business, they feel they need to conform to masculine norms and become alpha-male about how they run a company. That’s bullshit. You should run a company the best way you know how.”
Shattering the stereotypes and building confidence among female entrepreneurs will come through sharing stories, said Depledge.
“We are quite reluctant role models but we do have a duty to play. We need to do more to prove that this is possible. We need to show real, normal people who are achieving, not superstars.”
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Such statements will set the tone at this Thursday’s Festival for Female Entrepreneurs in Bristol, where women leading businesses will gather for a day of networking and advice.
“The women we see are naturally more cautious, they are energised by building a sustainable business in a manageable way,” said Emma Jones, founder of small business network Enterprise Nation, which will be hosting Thursday’s event.
She said the organisation’s workshops will often have more female attendees than male ones.
“Where they need help most is with gaining the confidence to take a risk, at what stage they need to take on board finance, and how to get it. Women still find accessing finance harder than men.”
Last year, Enterprise Nation’s report found that of the 2.9m home-based firms in Britain, more than 60% are run by women.
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Lindsey Bauer helps to form that statistic, but says she is keen for her venture to leave home eventually. In August she started selling her designer prams, which are made in China. Buyers placed orders following Bauer’s successful crowdfunding campaign on Crowdcube.
Though she raised £90,000 from 140 investors for Exeter-based Otti Prams, the initial concept of exchanging cash for equity over the internet was daunting.
“ I was a bit nervous about all these strangers coming on board and how much of a say they would have in my company,” said Bauer, 39, who has a deal to supply House of Fraser, as well as a clutch of independent stores. For each pram sold, £30 goes to charity.
The crowdfunding experience was enough to give Bauer the confidence to believe she could build a household name.
“It’s opened my eyes to being more flexible about how you raise capital,” she said. “Knowing we have investors behind us gives us the incentive to make our company a success.”
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In Bristol, Jaya Chakrabarti runs her digital design and marketing agency Nameless.
She said that starting her company in 1999 gave her control of her future. She now has six staff managing 20 clients.
“There’s a huge perception issue about what it takes to run a business. You choose who you work with and who you walk away from. We’ve walked away from some serious contracts on moral grounds.”
Perceptions can be changed if more females come forward to share their journeys.
“We need some of the mums who have started in their kitchen and have been in a similar situation with a lack of confidence. Maybe then we can stop feeling apologetic,” she said.