The marketing agency
Carla Barker was due to start a new marketing job on March 23 last year— the day the UK went into lockdown. By the end of the week, she was told there was no longer a role for her. She applied for more than 200 jobs during the first few months of the pandemic but was unsuccessful, so decided to establish her own business. Barker, 31, used savings to launch her marketing agency, Greyrose, in July.
“Founding a business was always at the back of my mind, but it’s never something I thought I would do,” she said. Barker is glad she took the plunge: she has built a client base of small businesses, charities and freelancers, both in her local Northamptonshire and farther afield. She said the shift to remote working had made it easier to pitch for work across the country, and hopes this flexibility will also help her as a working mother — she found out she was expecting her first child a month after setting up Greyrose and her baby is due in three weeks. “I want to continue to grow my business [after maternity leave],” she said. “I love what I do.”
The micro-bakery
Emma Powell has just celebrated her first anniversary. The Baker’s House in Helmsley, North Yorkshire, opened on March 24, 2020, the day after the first national lockdown began.
“It feels like a big achievement to have done a whole year,” she said. Powell, 51, had been planning to open her own business after spending most of her life working in bakeries, and pressed on with her plans as the pandemic hit. She uses local and seasonal ingredients wherever possible. Many of her suppliers are independents, whose products she sells alongside the cakes, tarts and pastries she bakes herself.
“We’ve had really strong local support,” she said. “The community has made the bakery part of their essential shopping, which has been lovely.” Powell is currently the only staff member, baking from 4am every day, with the shop open three days a week. She has been approached by local businesses about supplying wholesale baked goods, and is looking into providing courses teaching the art of baking.
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The consultancy
Pilot Paul Green decided to change course after being made redundant when Flybe collapsed in March last year: “A friend of mine who works in the NHS said to me, ‘You should teach the stuff you’ve learnt in the cockpit.’ ”
This gave Green, 35, the idea for The Cockpit Method, a consultancy he set up with his wife Amy, 37, in August. They used savings to launch the business, and received support, too, from the government’s New Enterprise Allowance scheme. Green’s initial plan was to coach business owners, but one of his first clients was the NHS — training frontline workers in managing stress and fatigue. “You can’t just step away when there’s an emergency in the cockpit — and it’s the same for them during the pandemic,” he said. Green’s virtual wellbeing sessions have been in high demand, and he has worked with big corporates including drug-maker Glaxo Smith Kline. He plans to expand the business by taking on other redundant pilots to deliver sessions.
The bike repair shop
Tony and Graham Childs went into business together in March last year, days before the pandemic hit. The brothers, both keen cyclists, launched GC Bike Repairs in Portsmouth and have been “ridiculously busy” since, thanks to a combination of key workers avoiding public transport and locked-down punters looking for new hobbies. “We’re a really good team,” said Graham, 51, who focuses on repairs, while Tony, 55, combines repairs with back office work. Graham was previously manager of a cycle shop; Tony owned a travel business and worked for a fitted bedrooms company. Graham was made redundant, which sparked their plan.
After working out of Graham’s garage for months, just before Christmas they signed a lease on a shop. The brothers have hired two staff members, plan to add a couple of apprentices and are looking at taking on another site. More than a year into the pandemic, demand “shows no signs of slowing down”. They do expect business to ease off as restrictions are lifted but hope that some Covid cyclists, at least, will stick with the hobby. Tony said: “If we can get even a third of the people who have been cycling during lockdown to carry on, that’s only a good thing.”
The art retailer
It was during the first lockdown, at a time when retailers were closed, that Jane Berriman decided to open a shop. “People did say to me, ‘You must be mad’,” said the 39-year-old. But she pressed on and launched Art & Soul in September. The company rents space at its shop in Beverley, East Yorkshire, to about 100 local artists and sells their work online. “None of our artists on their own would be able to access the high street,” said Berriman. “It’s an opportunity for 100 little businesses who could never take on a shop themselves.”
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Berriman decided the business would need to build a strong online presence, as “we knew we had to plan for lockdown to happen again”. That has allowed Art & Soul to keep trading, but now Berriman, and her three employees who have been on furlough, are preparing to welcome back customers to the shop tomorrow. She thinks its location near Beverley Minster — a big tourist destination in the town — could attract new business from staycationing families in the summer.