She Walked Away From Law And Built Coffee Republic

0:00The hell with it, I'm just gonna leave, I'm just really miserable here. I just can't go to the office anymore so unhappy and it was just getting louder and louder that voice and then I was like the hell with it I'm just gonna leave and just take some time off because I'm just really miserable here and it's not getting any better I started the whatsapp group of three people because that's the only way you get it going right and the three went to five went to ten you know what I mean like exponentially just because I started I started somewhere and I started small. Every day I'm absolutely amazed and in awe of the power of women and look how much we talk about what women don't have and I just want to change the focus on gosh look at them look what they've done look what they've achieved.

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1:23Now let's jump into the main conversation. so Sahar um just before Coffee Republic became real for you what was going on internally like both mentally and emotionally can you can you talk me through that if you can travel back in time um well Alex at that time I was a lawyer but a very unhappy solicitor and um but not really thinking I could ever change careers and entrepreneurship was really never an option for me. But then my dad died. And it was such a shock. He was very young. When I think of it now, he was sort of 62. And he died overnight. Yeah, overnight of a stroke. And I remember, you know, sometimes, as they say, adversity breeds creativity, it was that sort of wake up call.

2:09More like the rug had been pulled from under my feet. And I was like, gosh, I, you know, I thought there was like a comfort zone, there was like a safety. and I think very quickly I realized actually if stuff can change so much then what am I holding on to and I might as well just do what I love if life's so damn short. So I think that that's where I was and essentially in a career that I started as a lawyer really happy loving it you know I've always wanted to be a lawyer I love I love that I watched all those programs but then just seeing actually that it didn't really suit my personality and that I wasn't thriving and I could see it by comparison that other people were thriving around me and I wasn't.

2:52And was there therefore a sense that something had to change for you even if you kind of didn't know what that was almost? Yeah 100 % I just remember I just can't go to the office anymore so unhappy and it was just getting louder and louder that voice and sometimes you don't know what to do. So the whole time I was also interviewing for jobs, thinking I'm going to become an in-house lawyer. So I think when you get that call with that discomfort starts, something that just gets louder and louder, I kept trying other options. And I think it's really important. So I kept getting interviews for other jobs to work in-house at film companies or kind of Quaker Oats, the kind of foods company.

3:33And I just wasn't getting those jobs. But I just was just unhappiness was really building up and I think it really came to a head when my dad died and then I was like the hell with it I'm just gonna I'm just gonna I'm just gonna leave and just take some time off because I'm just really miserable here and it's not getting any better and it was getting better and better for other people who would obviously found their place you know who'd sort of managed to align who they are and it was just so obvious that I wasn't there and that they were there yeah and what was that for you then um that's that screw it just do it moment like for some people it's it's it's the fear it's the it's the it's the confidence it's it's something else maybe it's the lack of permission did you almost feel that with your father's passing you you you had permission to go and do the thing to pursue yeah it was just it was sort of giving permission to myself right I mean I suppose my equivalent of um screw it do it is leap and the net will appear I think if I was known for one thing, my epitaph would be, she said leap in the net.

4:39I actually nicked it from someone I'm sure that I read. It's not invented, but it's sort of something I'm known for is that taking that leap and the net will appear. And sometimes as well, there's a quote I've kind of got in the first book I wrote. And that's, you know, you're only going to find new oceans if you lose sight of the shore. so sometimes it's you've just got to leave what you're doing and you've got to take that leap basically yeah and did you at that time when you took the time out remind me was that taking time out from from the law firm was there a safety net that you could you could go back and you said you're intervening for other firms but um but yeah yeah no no we were just basically thinking i'm going to become an in-house lawyer so it was very very temporary absolutely not a single glimmer of I want to start my own business.

5:27I mean, this was in the, you know, in the early 90s, you know, no one really started their own business. I mean, there was like Richard Branson who was up there. There was Dame Anita Roddick, but we didn't really know about her because they just information wasn't around. So, you know, literally, there was just one single entrepreneur in the whole of the world. And that was Richard Branson. And he was pretty adventurous and a bit of an adrenaline junkie. And I just didn't relate to that image of an entrepreneur in any way. It's interesting. Actually, we mentioned Richard. I worked for Virgin Atlantic for 17 years.

5:59And then I went on to work at Virgin Startup for another five years with him. And somebody posted up the other day and tagged me in it on social media platform. And it was the launch of Virgin Cola in Johannesburg in South Africa. And I was there for the launch along with other people. And there's about, I don't know, 20 of us. And we're all in a group photo with Richard and we're all, you know, drinking and he's, you know, launching this brand. And it's interesting because people remember the successes, but they don't remember the failures. And Cola, you know, is one of his biggest failures, of course.

6:34Yeah, but people don't remember it. And you kind of, you know, read his books afterwards. And I think at the time he was only in his forties, you know, had a record company and an airline. I kind of look back and go, it's crazy. But, you know, you read backwards and he was like, it was literally Coca-Cola and Pepsi putting pressure on the supermarkets to just not stock his product. And of course, online these days is very different to what we had back in those days. And it wasn't an option, right? But that just, he just never let that stop him, right? So that's what's the reason. No, that's right.

7:05Absolutely. And looking back now then for your situation, then when you took that time out, what were you overthinking that really didn't matter when you kind of look back on things? Well, you know, I suppose it's what I tell myself. It was, you know, I was very worried about, I mean, I was quite young. So you don't really overthink when you're young, I don't think, or you don't remember the overthinking. But it was just this desperate pressure that, I'm a lawyer, I must find a job being another lawyer. Am I going to find a job? Am I going to ever find that happiness? And, but thank God, you know, I sort of listened to that voice and I'd never taken a gap year.

7:42I ended up kind of going traveling for three months. And just taking that time. And it was just, you know, then by chance that entrepreneurship sort of slapped into me in a way. But slammed into me. I don't know what the word is. That's what I find sometimes you've got to, if you're searching, if you're asking, but not just sitting there passively asking. If you're asking and doing and trying to open many, many doors that just end up going nowhere. eventually the right answer will come to you and and that is that is that is a big thing I think I've learned that it's okay not to know but but just just keep really really asking as another entrepreneur friend of mine says not a wishy-washy ask but really put it out there and and also to allude to your point I suppose it's it's there's you can think all you like but there's a moment where you've got to turn the thinking into action right and you know manifest physically manifest what you're going to do um and for you and your brother when did you stop talking about it and actually you know said screw it we're gonna do this you know um well I mean it was not really no talking about it I mean I was just I went to America saw these coffee bars fell in love with it you know literally got back that first night had a conversation with my brother saying oh my god I just love these coffee bars I can't believe we haven't got them I wish we had them and my brother was like um this is a great business idea and I'm like actually I don't know what you're talking about because I'm a lawyer I do not want to go into the coffee business so I think you've got the wrong person I've got no intention I'm going to become an in-house lawyer somewhere and but it was really my brother was like okay I'll pay you to do some research for me and the very next day after that conversation straight after I got back to America I got myself on the circle line and could you know went around this sort of 27 stops on the circle line to see what there was.

9:39So I did something and then action, action, action that night I got home. I was like, I can't believe it. There's nothing like what I'd seen in America. And then, you know, next thing you know, you've got a little to-do list next thing, you know, I'm, I'm researching stuff. So, um, I am, I, I mean, when you say overthinking, I mean, it's just the worst thing anyone can do. And now as I get older, as life comes in, I mean, I just, and you know, the team I have around me at the moment. It's just our biggest, the pitfall that we have as humans, really, the ability to not do and just be thinking. I think it's absolutely useless to be thinking about anything, to be honest.

10:15And what about the mindset that you needed? When you kind of look back, do you think you were a natural entrepreneur? Was it something that you really had to study and and learn and maybe the same for your brother as well yeah um no i mean you know basically i remember when my brother said we should start this business i was like okay that's fine i'll go to business school i'll come back in two years and we'll start it perfect i'll be fully equipped and he actually said to me you're about to go to the best business school in the world and i love that yeah and it really is and that's really when i learned about entrepreneurship that as long as you're the customer as long as you know what you're trying to get what you want to see in my case it was I want to be walking around London getting skinny lattes everywhere and walking around with my lovely cup of sort of skinny latte and a little muffin attached to it.

11:07As long as you've got that image in your head, then as humans, we are problem solvers. We're resourceful. You're activating that side of you. So that's why I wrote my book, Anyone Can Do It, after I left, because I think we all have those qualities within us. So entrepreneurship isn't special qualities. It's just a natural qualities as as humans we were born with you know as humans we're you know if we have a problem we don't kind of just lie back on it we try to solve it we're natural problem solvers and all entrepreneurship is is just it's you using that those human qualities in business yeah and I can still picture the cover of your book because I read it till the cover fell to pieces uh as I mentioned to you before but and it was at that time I'd finished at Virgin Atlantic and I just always had this itch to scratch you know to start my own business and i think just being in a environment at virgin where you know one week i'm in johannesburg helping launch virgin cola the next week um i'm in la at a pool party with richard branson and i can remember he was going off to meet buzz aldrin who was the second man on the moon and mr hilton like paris hilton's father for for dinner and he just like you look back and you go i actually wish i'd realized when i was in my early twenties, you know, the, the magnitude of what was, what was going on.

12:25But, you know, my idea was to then go and launch, um, you know, one of these kids play areas cause I just had small children. And whilst I never actually launched that, I launched, you know, four or five different businesses instead. It was, you know, the foundations of what I was learning in that book where you were literally talking through how you were, you know, you've researched the market. Yeah. And it, you know, it was phenomenal, phenomenal. And I think, you know, It doesn't matter if you're not necessarily looking to open a coffee shop, of which, again, it must, I don't know if it astounds you or not, but the amount of coffee shops that you see in every town that are still opening.

13:01We just had another one open here from a couple of guys we know, another independent coffee shop. Like 5 ,000 of them or whatever in the UK at the moment. Yeah, it's incredible. Yeah, it really is nuts. And that's why I wrote that book because it all happened so quickly. It was only after I sold that I thought actually there was a sort of pattern to that. It wasn't just, it just wasn't my experience. It wasn't some sort of a genius I'd suddenly been given. It was just, these are the, this is, I did, there was a series of steps that gets you from an idea in your head to physical reality and let me write those steps down.

13:37And if you hadn't taken that leap when you did, what do you think, what do you think would have happened? Have you ever thought about that? Oh, my God. Alex, I think I would have been a very unhappy person because, you know, that's what I really kind of want to tell people is that, you know, if you're not happy what you're doing, especially the young people, it's just keep looking, keep trying until you find somewhere where you really feel this is playing to my strengths. and we all know where that is when we're in the flow right where who we are and what we do are aligned together um and you often know where that is because by definition if you're not enjoying it means you're you know pretty crap in it anyway that you know you can't motivate yourself to enjoy something um you know if you're not enjoying it means it's not the right one for you so you just keep going until you find that place that it just flows like like that book you know it's just it's you're in the flow I think is what you're trying to get to and I think people talk about you know looking for a passion and stuff I kind of think it's less look for your passion more like look for where you where who you are and what you do are so aligned together that work almost doesn't feel like work it feels like a sort of creative expression of your soul sort of thing I agree and I was like a friend of mine again who I've met through the podcast a guy called Simon Squibb that a lot of people will know.

14:57And he's been on here a couple of times as well. And he was posting over Christmas, like I'm working on Christmas Day and Boxing Day. This isn't advocating for everyone to do this, but it was that whole point of, because I'm so passionate about what I'm doing and I'm literally in the flow, I can't stop. I block time out to do this and I will still be having Christmas with my family and my son, but it doesn't feel like work. And I'm the same when it comes to, you know, what I'm doing and what I'm passionate about. And it's what are your thoughts on, you know, for people who want to start a business, going back to your previous point, do you think you need to go to university to do a business degree?

15:40Or do you think the best education is to start something, to fail, to go again? Yeah, I mean, it's funny. I suppose people's circumstances are different, right? But I definitely think that it's really beneficial to work for someone else. I think definitely in terms of working for someone else and seeing stuff from the ground up, especially when you're young, it's quite, you know, in my view actually to young people is, you know, it's bloody hard starting your business, right? There's a lot, there's a lot there. And so when you're young, go and work with someone else, go and learn. And there's a lot to be learned.

16:19give yourself three five years um well while you're just starting your career where you can kind of legally work to work somewhere else and learn from them I learned you know even being a lawyer I learned so much not in terms of the legal stuff but just you know what is what it's like to build what you know even all the hours I spent when I was a junior lawyer photocopying or proof reading that just shows you that you know um work doesn't come from just like a great idea you do it It just comes from hard grind day after day. And I think that's what's really important. So my advice often, you know, if your circumstances are such that you've got no other option and you want to try something, absolutely.

16:58But, you know, if you're also somewhere where you can go and work in a big company and see what it's like, I think it's a great opportunity at the beginning of your career. So I wanted to let you know about something that I see trip founders up all the time. If you're running a business with international payments, one of the biggest hidden costs is often foreign exchange. World First is built specifically for businesses operating across borders, helping you manage payments, hold multiple currencies and reduce unnecessary FX costs. They're not a high street bank trying to do everything. They focus purely on international business payments and currency exchange.

17:33That's their thing. Switching providers is a commitment, which is why they're giving our listeners 50 fee-free business transactions to properly test their service. Plus, signing up for an account is completely free and there are no ongoing monthly fees. You've got 60 days from sign up to use them. Head to worldfirst.com forward slash screw it and get your 50 fee-free business transactions. Now back to the podcast. It's super tough to do everything on your own and you're putting a lot of pressure on yourself on the thing. you know especially like you know your teens and your 20s should all be about you know trying stuff out making those mistakes not worrying about the consequences and i think if you can learn from somebody else um it's it's the greatest way to do it and i think subconsciously i i did that you know myself personally back in the day just learning for somebody like rich because because exactly you know you're talking about those experiences and when you're really young you know if you can if your circumstance is such that you can go to university you're still young you know go go for three years meet some great friends you know live life a bit you know entrepreneurship is great but you know I'm sure you'd agree it's not the fairy tale people think it is it's it's real life it's you know you start hiring people it's a huge responsibility if your business grows so you know there's plenty of time for it is my point you've got your whole you know 30s 40s 50s you know it's a long long time in your life to do that and I think young people at the moment they sort of see that and they're like god i i see so many young people who are like oh god i'm really late i've got to do it i'm behind and i'm like you're only 24 um you're definitely not behind there there's no time limit on this no and there's plenty of examples isn't there from like you know colonel saunders i think the famous one with kfc in his 60s or yeah 70s i think you're right i think you're right um and that you know you don't want put that pressure on yourself and i agree as well go away to university um learn about life right like learn about meeting new people and living on your own and all those kinds of things i think is enjoy life you know and then the right time comes yeah it does it does um and maybe what about um your thoughts on for those people you know a lot of businesses it's it's it's finding um a problem trying to solve that problem and quite often it it could be like an example like of richard and looking at a coca-cola and pepsi and going up against the big guys you've got experience of that coffee republic going up against brands like starbucks costa cafe nero um interested to know did that intimidate you or did that kind of sharpen your focus at the time yeah i mean i think um at least my point of view is you're not really thinking i'm gonna go against the big guys you're thinking um there's there's a product that i want that i can't find and um my idea for the product is really great and it's better than what's out there.

20:25So I remember with Coffee Republic, Starbucks came much later. So, I mean, Costa wasn't even sort of someone at that point. Costa was a whole different thing. Caffe Nero had like two stores literally, and it wasn't, it was a very old Italian style coffee bar. So there was no one really to look at. There was Starbucks in America that was huge. And I remember we opened Coffee Republic in 95 and then Starbucks came to the UK in 97. And I remember being terrified, thinking, oh, my God, you know, we just moved out of my mom's kitchen table and there is Starbucks having expanded in America. UK was its first international destination.

21:05And instead of worrying about Starbucks is so big, whatever, I just thought about the customers. I'm like, the customers we've got, you know, are they happy? Are they getting the best latte they can in the morning? Are they getting a great experience when they come into the store? Why would they go to Starbucks as a customer, you know? So it just, you don't sort of freak yourself out. Like, whereas if you, because I believe it's about that individual customer experience, looking at your business through your customer's eyes. And that's all that matters because you can look at that. Your customer's not looking a big picture, not looking, oh God, Starbucks is an amazing company.

21:39if Starbucks is better cheaper offer something that we're not then you need to get worried but if in through the customer's eyes you're like actually we are better and that's how everyone's going to look at their business and ultimately you you exited that business um and I'm interested to know by women built um where did that idea come from you could have gone and done a million different things right off the back of something like that why choose by women built and and could you explain to our audience what you're looking to achieve? Yeah, well, I mean, first I'll say in terms of exiting the business that was in after five years left Coffee Republic.

22:18And it was a huge it was a very sad thing leaving a business you start so quickly, thinking that that phase of entrepreneurship is over and the company doesn't need us anymore. And and it's sort of sad to think that, you know, when we gave it to the kind of grown ups to run it took them eight years to take coffee probably to the ground for the company to go into administration which as a founder is one of the saddest things although it was eight years after we left and so I was sort of a bit in a limbo whereby you know I've written my book anyone could do it then I wrote um a kind of two more two more books the last ones switched on and start up forever about how you know the mistake we made was not to keep that sort of start time mindset as you grow I wish we'd done that I wish we realized how important our passion was but then I was thinking well I'll just end up you know writing books and doing speeches and then it was during COVID where as you remember everyone was kept talking about you know are you going to be like writing your best sending book or the big screenplay you always wanted and I was like this is rubbish like I'm not doing any of those things but it was literally I was sort of sitting there going through my Twitter because I had time to actually look at my Twitter you know it's funny when time slows slows down and you're not busy it's extraordinary how much more empty and receptive your mind can be and this this tweet just popped up and I noticed it and and again the proviso is I am sure when I've been busy and I've been on the tube rushing to a meeting I wouldn't have even noticed this little golden tweet that was like appearing on my feed that ended up being life-changing to me but that tweet was not all of us can invest in women not all of us can mentor women, but we can all buy from them.

24:03And this concept of actually supporting a business by becoming its customer and buying from it is so powerful. And there's a lot of talk around investments, but a great business is a business that grows through revenue. That is the most sustainable way to grow, right? And I knew there were so many women-built brands that I used, but that I kind of thought the problem is people don't know how many brands around them are women built. And they don't know why it's so important to support women built brands, because our rates of female entrepreneurship in the UK are so low. I mean, no one could ever believe that our rates are 30 % lower than other developed countries.

24:43I mean, can you imagine why do we have such a low rate of female entrepreneurship in this country? 30 % lower than America, Canada, the Netherlands and that cost the UK economy 200 billion you see Alex even you didn't know that it's the most extraordinary step I know the I know the investment stats that's the funny thing yeah the two p out of every pound yeah yeah yeah but no one knows why in a country as developed as ours we have such a low few so few women start businesses and a lot of it um and that was from came from the rose review is around confidence you know it's almost you can't be what you can't see So the problem that we know about this investment stat, great.

25:20But imagine if you're a young girl at that point that we discussed thinking, should I go and start my own business? And all you hear is, two feet out of every pound goes to women-built businesses. You're not going to try, are you? So I thought, actually, let's change the narrative and let's put the focus on all the women who have already achieved something. Many of whom have come on your podcast. the people the Maxime Lesbys of this world the Janna Jensen's of this world the Thea Greens of this world the Vivian Wongs of this world you know these women who've started incredible brands but the problem is we know the brands but we often don't know the women behind them and we're missing a trick so I've never it's never really been about like that gender thing you know um people used to always ask me oh god have you come you know did you come across any barriers because you're a woman and I used to always say not really you know the barriers or my own weaknesses as human not because I was a woman but I think in in the UK we have this deficit of female entrepreneurship we have this issue of lack of confidence lack of visibility so we need to solve this by showing young girls or women just just just look what women achieved and I think female entrepreneurship and is testament to um the power of women I started um you know I remember I I sort of came up with the excel spreadsheet of all the women book brands I knew and I actually came up with 35 of them thinking that's it and I was like oh maybe maybe there aren't that many women built brands um to give you an idea we now have two and a half thousand women built consumer brands only in the UK can you imagine that they're raising their hand going hey I'm a woman and I built this consumer brand two and a half thousand um in the space of sort of three four years since I started wow so from 35 that you found I thought that was it and I thought that we had a lot but I didn't realize that we had so many and still to this day and I'm pretty good my lawyer days give me pretty good due diligence skills and still when you know they submit a form on our website and um whatever kind of like my team they're like oh my god this person I'm like oh my god I had no idea this brand was woman built you know still I had oh my god I had no idea this brand was woman built and we have so many incredible women built brands around us um we have our own aisle on a carter now we have 200 brands on the car that are women built and and women run i mean could you imagine um so yeah so that's that's why when both we've got a kite mark we've got these retailer partnerships um and we've got a community of female founders kind of holding hands i was going to say how big's the community next i know i've had those conversations with uh the likes of joe dalton and melissa snover all these amazing female business owners that that you know um yeah what what's the community at now yeah the community is at so two and a half thousand there are like um 1500 on the platform um I started you know people like Melissa Snurver and um Maxine they all sort of came on a WhatsApp that I started with like three founders and that's grown but now it's grown beyond that to to a to an enormous platform and I'm learning all about my new skill is community building because that's really interesting building communities it's a tough one as well right I was just listening yesterday, I think, to Ella Mills, who was on Chris Evans' podcast.

28:36And she was literally just talking about that and kind of going again now, having sold the business. And community building is tough, but it's been a buzzword for a long time. But it seems to me like this year and last year particularly, people – and I think it's also coming off the back of post-COVID, right? Like people feel that they want to belong to something that they, you know, back to, you know, we started a company last year and put on Maxine and Melissa all came at the NEC called the Festival of Entrepreneurs. And it really got that feeling that, you know, people wanted to meet people again and have those conversations and move things forward, like in their business and in their professional lives.

29:19But it felt like that was missing for a while, but people really want to belong to something, right? Yeah, absolutely. And kind of what I found was the whole talk was always about, oh, networking happens on the golf course. And there's the old boys club or whatever of networking. And actually, we didn't realize women are so bloody amazing in networking because we're such natural chat. You know, we're chatty. We are we want we love sharing. We love talking about our problems. So women just come so naturally creating a community of women. um I tell you it's pretty he's creating a community of alpha women because all these women you know haven't just had an idea they've actually done it and they work with the speed of light so um I have to say it just really keeps you on their toes because they are so amazing and so efficient and so on it and that I just can't tell you it's just every day I'm absolutely just amazed and in awe of of the power of women and you know look how much we talk about what women don't have and And I just want to sort of change the focus on, gosh, look at them.

30:22Look what they've done. Look what they've achieved. You know, if they did it, you can do it too. Exactly. And it's interesting, actually, when you're talking before, like, you know, what is the reason why there aren't more women-built businesses? And whether that's, like you say, confidence or something like that. And it reminded me for years, I think going back to, when did I do the first one? I saw one of the things I've also done is host workshops for people who are looking to start a podcast. And it was really interesting, literally from like 2017 up until last year, I've been hosting these in, um, you know, London, Bournemouth, you know, all over the place.

30:59And you can guarantee every single one, I cap it at like 12 people and there will be 11 women and there'll be one man. There's always a token man. Yet again, if you look at the stats and you look at the charts and all the rest of it, the amount of male hosted podcast versus female is crazy. And I don't know what it is, but it would be really interesting to find out how that is skewed differently. And I think things are changing because there are more, say, well-known females who are already known for something else who now have a podcast. Like Inella Mills, for example, is an obvious example. But it's having those people that people can identify that they can then go and do the same thing.

31:39And it's the same with starting a business, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. You see someone doing it, you're much more likely to try, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. What skills have you learnt or taught yourself when it comes to community building? Then what do you think has been super helpful for those people who are listening, who also have communities, who are looking to kind of build that community around their brand, around their business? Gosh, well, you know, I mean, in a funny way, It's just around that idea of authenticity and, you know, going back to why you're doing this, always going back to the why and not getting too carried away again with I'm building a community.

32:23Sort of going back to why did you start this community? What is the purpose? What is the real, genuine why of the community? And for me, again, I mean, I've now got a team of five. You know, I'm sort of running something again. And I never thought I'd be running something again. I thought forever I'd be writing books and talking about what I did. And so running something live and creative is almost a gift I never thought I had. But the biggest gift to me is having learned what I've learned about the mistakes I made when Coffee Republic grew. It's actually just always keeping the way we're running By One Build is, as I said, number one, focused on the why.

33:03And for me as a founder, the joy of why I started it. what why sorry um it's for me as a founder it's going back to the joy of why I started this in the first place the real you know always remembering that but as well you know stuff like not getting too processy the other day my um the sort of the team were like actually so you know what you know it's great we all work like that but you know I think I think it'd be really good to have some sort of organization structure so I kind of like put together an org chart and I was like this is what so-and-so does and this is what so-and-so does and then started the annex like about like two three weeks in I was like there's something's changed for some reason not everyone's getting involved in everything there's like I feel we're getting a bit silo-y and then I was like oh my god it's the damn org chart I've just got to get like and so I took the org chart and I was like actually do you know what we've got but there's lines is I'm just going to kind of cross out a bit the org charts because I don't want us to get too processy I want us to always try things you know because as we get bigger we have ideas and I just told like kind of like one of my team I was like actually whatever idea you have just put it on paper let's just start it let's just start the first draft of the idea let's just do it let's do it really badly my motto in life is everything you know just just everything you want to do you've got to do it badly it's just you've got to stop because if you do it badly you're going to do it and let's just do it badly let's not worry about doing it perfectly so just I'm always trying to keep that what I've learned around that entrepreneurial mindset.

34:32And I've been given another chance and I absolutely love it and it's challenging and I'm lost again and I'm out of my comfort zone and I can't switch off, but I love it, right? And that's why just, you know, when people say, what's your hobby? I can tell your energy is lifting just talking about it. It's amazing. Exactly, it's sort of, it's like a hobby, as we said, right? Back to what Simon Scribd was saying. I mean, people ask me what my hobby is. I mean, this is my hobby, like, yeah. Yeah. And where did the idea like come from? When was that moment that, again, kind of, you know, we talked about it with Coffee Republic, but with Why Women Built, what was the moment where you decided, actually, instead of just thinking about this, I'm actually going to make it happen and create something?

35:15Yeah. Well, I mean, I saw the tweet. I've got, I mean, the great thing nowadays is we have more of a record of our actions. Yeah, just screenshot it right. Yes, do you know what I mean? We write texts, we write, it's easy. It's not like calling someone up on the phone. So I remember immediately, immediately I emailed Jacqueline The Rockers who'd written that tweet. And I was like, Jacqueline, that was really powerful what you said. We should do something around this. So could you imagine that was my immediate response? And then it took me about, and I remember thinking, God, this is really amazing.

35:43I just, there was something bigger. Like I could just feel this sort of, sort of force really in that idea. And then I texted Barney McCauley, who's a sort of marketing guru. And I was like, I want to start a movement around female entrepreneurship. Will you do this? But then I fall into my own trap because for one whole year, I had a bunch of Zoom calls with everyone I know in the ecosystem and everyone going, brilliant idea, brilliant idea. I remember after a whole year thinking, shoot, this is going to go to the graveyard of all ideas because all I've done is have Zoom calls. Brilliant. Wow, what an idea.