Why This Billion-Dollar Brand Walked Away from Facebook

0:00As an entrepreneur, you can't be afraid of failure because the chances are something will happen along the way that wasn't planned.

0:06Alex Chisnall:Rowena Bird is the co-founder of Lush, the global cosmetics brand built on sustainability, activism and handmade products. I would be quite frightened for suddenly to have an investor come in and give me loads of money and say, right, now you can take it from 100 shops to 800 shops. However exciting and sexy that sounds, the reality is you've got to run that business. And if you haven't learned how to run an 800-shot business, that's a recipe for disaster. For you, what is an entrepreneur? I think it's somebody who has got the right mix of bravery and stupidity. Welcome to Screw It, Just Do It, the show for those who decided to screw it and just did it.

0:47Alex Chisnall:I'm Alex Chisnell, host of this podcast and co-founder of the Festival of Entrepreneurs at the NEC in Birmingham this October 8th and 9th. This is the podcast that brings you face-to-face with the entrepreneurs and business rebels who threw caution to the wind and built something extraordinary. Want to surround yourself with 5 ,000 to 10 ,000 entrepreneurs who've already decided to screw it and just do it? The Festival of Entrepreneurs is happening October the 8th and 9th at the NEC Birmingham, and I'm giving away free two-day pass to my listeners. 200-plus speakers, 90-plus sessions, billion-pound entrepreneurs sharing their real stories, not theory, but the actual strategies they use to scale.

1:25Alex Chisnall:Head to festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk right now and claim your free pass because the best networking happens when you're in the room with people who've already decided to screw it and just did it. Well, right. Look, thanks for joining me again. It's always massively appreciated because I know how busy you are. Tell me to start with, what was life like before you became a business owner and became an entrepreneur? I would say it was pretty much the same really I mean I sort of so I went through college became a beauty therapist came down to pool joined Mark and Liz and there was only sort of five six seven of us then and so and I think the way that I've been brought up in the business world by Mark and Liz was to be a doer to say yes to give things a go and not have a job title as such but to have a job that's all-encompassing and I think that that has led then on to when we started Lush as the six of us each one of us had our own skill set because we'd always been encouraged to sort of have a go at everything and find out you know what you were good at and I think that that made a difference so I don't really there was no difference between going to you know before Lush and after it's just it's organic growth really and now I I do more of what I've always done but with more people and did you ever see yourself um you know back in those days when you trained to become a beauty therapist etc did you see yourself ever building a business was that something that was on on your radar I think you always think that you know I thought probably thought I'd have my own salon because I think that you know when you do your training they give you all the business side of it as well because I suppose that's what most people do they're going to work um on their own sort of like the visiting houses or they're going to start their own clinic or own salon.

3:37So, you know, I thought I would probably have my own salon. It's turned into much more than that.

3:42Alex Chisnall:Just a bit. Yeah, just a bit. And where did the idea for Lush come from then, for those who don't know the story? So before Lush, so I've worked with the same team of people for now 44 years. So before Lush, we were manufacturers. We had a small beauty clinic at the wrong end of the pool and we manufactured for the body shop. So we invented product for them and sold it to them and then they filled it and put it in their shops. So we were doing all of that. And then Body Shop sold where they floated. And so the shareholders were saying, well, you can't have a company as big as Constantine because you're too dependent on them.

4:27If something happens to them, then that affects the whole business. It makes sense. So they bought the formulas off us. And with that money, we then started Cosmetics To Go, which was a mail order catalogue. So mail order in those days, very different to what it is now because there was no internet. So you had computers, but it was really for putting your names and addresses on. It wasn't for, you know, interaction really. So we started a mail order business. And then we thought, you know, in mail order 30 years ago, well, it would have been 34 years, 35 years ago. It was very different. You placed an order by phone or by post or by somebody who ran the catalogue and you got your order a week or two weeks later.

5:09And we just thought, well, it's ridiculous. If you've got your order from somebody, just send it out now. That made common sense to us. So I think we were among the first to do same day or next day deliveries because we couldn't see the sense of holding on to somebody's money. And then, you know, it just built things up. It just made life more difficult. so we started out we ran that for four years we learned a lot of lessons I would say really that was our training ground for Lush so you must never be as an entrepreneur you can't be afraid of failure because the chances are something will happen along the way that you wasn't planned so we weren't planning to lose cosmetics to go we loved it with you know um I still mourn the days of it but I'm grateful that I had it because we've learned lots of lessons for Lush so we lost that business through over trading and also not really understanding that we didn't have to go into receivership just because the bank decided it wanted to call in the money it lent us didn't mean that we had to go into receivership that was a hard lesson to look back on and think oh blimey we didn't have to have done that customer service has always been really important and we did a lot customer service we we were always putting little treats in parcels but in hindsight they're probably quite expensive sticks of rock um expensive lovely chocolate or there was always something free or we put like a little product in and then we were given this very sound advice to you always have purse openers so for product that is cheaper so it has less of a margin but it gets people into spending their money with you.

6:49This is called a purse opener. What we didn't realize was when we did our fatal last sale, we did so many purse owners, we didn't sell any of the higher or not as much as we needed of the higher cost stuff with the bigger margin. Therefore, by the time we put free things in, by the time we'd sent the post out the same day, and sometimes we would do it, we'd split the parcel if we didn't have a product made because we were still making all our own products so you we would be paying for two parcels we did free post and packaging we were doing so many things for free that actually our margins just went then we had um a flood over Christmas where the the radiator upstairs hadn't had the screw thing put back on we were having something works done in the building so the the central heating came on the water started to flow around that flooded through the the floors and mark was given a call on christmas day boxing day saying that building that you've got in pool is glowing i think you need to come down and see what's going on so we lost all the computers with um databases i mean it was just it was you know it was awful and so pretty soon after that come the april we were just saying well we're going to have to just close down we've sort of we've over traded we've spent all our money we haven't got any yeah and

8:16Alex Chisnall:one of those things like you say that you does out of your control that happens like a act of god or whatever you want to call it that changes the track exactly and then we went through the most painful thing of having receivers in i mean goodness people go on about estate agents and traffic wardens receivers breed of their own uh but you know i mean they've got a job to do and and they came in and they did it and it was an unpleasant time for us because of the situation we were in i suppose so we then all you know the company was disbanded and we owed people money and it was it was a very it was an awful time because we didn't like being in that position we didn't want to owe people money it's one thing losing your business but you don't want to you're letting down the people that you're employing and all the rest of it so that all happened and we sort of disbanded and went and tried to find other jobs I wanted to be a hot air balloon pilot with Pellin Strand I went for an interview and it was amazing I got around the factory and met him and I was all very lovely but Mark had filled me with my own self-worth and so I was asking for too much money and so I didn't get the job I think you pretty yeah so that that didn't work other people went to work for other companies Liz went to time manager Carl went to a few others and it is it was disjointed and and you're still feeling almost you feel the shame of losing a business as well so there was quite a lot to deal with but we got together it was Mo's birthday in June and so and I don't know how we do it must have all been done on the phone because there wasn't mobile phones then it wasn't as easy as sending a text message should we all get together in the garden but we all congregated in Mark and Mo's garden for Mo's birthday and we were chatting and laughing and enjoying being together again as a group and Helen just said you know what I'm going to go back into 29 high street which is our head office it's our main base it's the building that was owned by mark mo and liz and she says i'm going to start making product and i said well if you're going to make product the helen then i'm going to come into the shop and i'll open the shop doors and i'll sell it so and i had i've just met mike who's now my husband but he's a carpenter so he came and helped me redo the shop so i refitted the shop painted it made it look different Liz came in and helped with the painting as well.

10:52And we just made it look different. Mark came in and made products with Helen. And the product was made literally in the lab upstairs, shipped downstairs, and then I would sell it.

11:02Alex Chisnall:What were the first products? The first products we had, we still have a lot of them today. So Butterball, which is a ballistic with cocoa butter in and smells vanilla. We still have that. The massage bars, because of course we had a lot of inventory from Cosmetics To Go. So, you know, we were taking the ideas that we'd had there. What we didn't have was money for packaging. So it was sort of like, well, you know, can we afford to start again? We are very much of the mindset that if you haven't put quality ingredients in, how can you get quality out? and we'd have made things that didn't really need any packaging the solid massage bars ballistics the solid bath bombs the solid shampoos so we'd made product that actually didn't need packaging soap but we used to package it in cosmetics go but we realized actually we didn't need to we thought let's put it out without packaging and see what people think i i didn't think people would like it i didn't think they'd go for it not we wouldn't want people to touch the product that they were going to buy.

12:11But in actual fact, people didn't really mind, didn't need all that excess packaging. We then, so we put those out and then Mark and I and Jo, who was our first employee, she knocked on the door one evening. It was always like that whole thing. He used to job. Whereas Mark and I were in the shop and I was writing blackboard signs saying, you know, this product is great for this. We went round on a tour. we went to Odbins where they used to write, I don't know if they still do, used to write on blackboards in what the wine is great with. And I always remember this wine was particularly great, this bag bog.

12:48And it was like, oh, Paul Smith, where Mark used to love to shop, but couldn't afford to now. And that was all the wooden furniture. We went to a big cheese shop in Covent Garden in Neil's Yard, where the cheeses were just great big ones that you cut. We went to fruit markets. and remembered our time in Sweden where they put water over them, but it's the stacking of the fruit. So that was like the idea for the bath bombs to make it look like fruit and have it stacked, tilted shells. So we took inspiration from places that we loved and that inspired us. And we wanted to create theatre on the high street.

13:27So when you come in, now you get the smell because we're unpackaged predominantly. you get somebody will show you how a bath bomb works they'll give you a hand and arm massage you might even be able to get like a little cleanse uh it's you know there's things going on to actually showcase the product and that's that's where we sort of started with let's create theater let's do away with stuff that we don't need um you know and it worked that people didn't actually need packaging and still today aren't asking for it uh and and see how it goes from there we thought we'll open shops within the m25 if we're lucky but start in the wrong end of high street and we had a call from a previous customer of cosmetics to go andrew geary and he just said um you know are you going to be making this shaving cream that we used to make and we went well we can yeah so and the conversation just went from there and he was working with somebody in London who would invest in companies and we were always a bit nervous about having people invest or anything because it was the bank pulling the plug on us that that meant we lost so that was made us a bit nervous but anyway Mark went and had conversation with Andrew and with Peter and Peter offered to invest a certain amount of money and I can't remember what it was, but it was something like£230 ,000.

15:04It wasn't a huge deal. I can say that today, but 30 years ago it felt like a lot of money. But it was under the things that we wouldn't be paying it back. It was like a temporary during the business and we would be paying it back. So we didn't give him shares in the business or anything.

15:22Alex Chisnall:Okay, yeah. I was going to say you're 100 % owned. Absolutely. We were still 100 % owned. And Mark, you know, we were following Mark. He was our boss from before. And he was very generous in so much as he gave the ones of us that started again. So myself, Helen, Paul, Mo, Liz, and himself. He did shares between us all. So obviously, being sensible, him and Mo, being the married couple, have the majority of the shares. So at any time they can pull rank and they have over 51%. So the business is in their control. But it belonged to all of us. And I still think that was a very generous move because he didn't have to do that.

16:10Because we'd have all still worked for him and with him because of our respect for him.

16:16Alex Chisnall:I was going to say, why do you think he did that then? Because of the esteem he held you in and what you could bring to the business? Well, I think so. But also, he is a very generous man. And his nature. He's not a greedy man either. So, you know, most of the money as he gives away is sort of, you know, he's doing something with it. we had a joke yesterday where I said to him that I'm going to staff another bank account any dividends he gets are going into that because to stop him spending it in case he needs it's all yeah with sort of you just oh for goodness sake because he used to do that to us I mean Carl and I both had our credit cards as youngsters cut up because they weren't good for us because we had to learn to survive on our money so yeah payback time um so we with the money that Peter gave us we opened our first little shop in Covent Garden and it was very tiny and um while I was opening that and setting up you know big business in London I wasn't a city girl at all I actually came from the countryside Northamptonshire moved to Poole and it was sort of a house in London um so that was all exciting but frightening at the same time.

17:32So opening that little shop, organising my wedding at the same time. And by the time I got married in July, by August, we were opening our first big shop at 80 square metres on King's Road. And the King's Road then was the road.

17:48Alex Chisnall:Yeah, yeah. I still live right near there, going back, yeah, two or three decades. Yeah. Well, I lived on it, Alex. I lived on the shop. Oh my gosh. Fantastic location. It was fantastic. We didn't have any money, so we couldn't live a London life. It's quite easy to live without money. And what was the vision then? If you're opening up the Covent Garden, then you're opening King's Road, what was the vision that you kind of mapped out between all of you? The vision was shops within the M25, and they were the first two locations that we were given. But from being on the King's Road, one of the important lessons always you're told is location, location, location.

18:27And it's really important. because if people don't know who you are and you stick yourself off a back street, people are never going to know who you are because so few people will walk past you. But if you have nerves of steel and you think, right, let's open on the King's Road, let's be visible. We weren't in the best area of the King's Road. We were further up. So we were in the second half rather than the first half, but it was still a great location. And from there, there was eyes on us. so we were we had somebody from Croatia see us who wanted to take business back their sister-in-law it was after the Croatian war had finished and she needed to find something to do to support her two children she lost her husband and we were seen by Canadians that were on holiday in London and sort of they were actually it was sort of like a late honeymoon for them they'd just been married as well similar time to Mike and I and they kept coming into the shop when it was and I kept saying look you know we're just we're new we're not doing anything we're not going to be selling we don't know anything about doing business elsewhere and in the end I had to phone Mark and Andrew sort of joined us by then and say look will you come and talk to these guys because they're not listening to me and so anyway cut a long story short we ended up doing business with them under the proviso these are our products this is how our shop looks but you have to do everything else because you we don't know anything about doing business in your country we don't know anything much about exporting and so but if you want to do that half of the business we will sort of will be the the product and the invention and

20:10Alex Chisnall:so it's like a formal agreement lawyer draft a contract yeah okay i mean we have quite different contracts today but they're they're still a long-stained premise and also when whenever we find a new partner for a new country because what that's our preferred method is to have a local person running that their business so an entrepreneur in their own country running that business and um the criteria is not how much money have you got and um you know do you want to do it it's like how do we all get on would we sit and have dinner with you would we like to spend time with you then have you got enough money what's your reasoning for wanting to do that do you share the same feelings as we do about quality about the products about not testing on animals and all those kind of things so and if all of those things align then um they become a partner so that means when we have a partner meeting you know it's a thing of joy yeah you like you like the people yeah you're surrounded by friends it's really nice i mean obviously you know things happen and you get you something get a bit niggly at times but it's not It's not a peasant, it's lovely.

21:19It's very much like a family. You all get niggly, don't you, with your brothers, sisters, mum, dad. So there's niggles. And the majority of the time, it's a great place to be. So, yeah, that really then led to opening a year later in Vancouver, shortly followed two weeks later by Croatia. And then after that, the country's just sort of rolled in and we expanded out and now we're in 53 countries. But because over the 30 years it's been so inorganic, oh, when we paid Peter back, I think it took us four years, but we paid Peter back. And we paid him back, I think it was treble what he invested to make it the best deal he'd ever done.

22:06And that was our aim, was to pay him back for the best deal he'd ever done. And it would be, we would be the best deal he'd ever done. and and that's what we did so the and that made us feel good because we were standing on our own two feet and that's always been you know even today we don't have huge loans in the business we look at other companies and we think blimey they've got millions they're in for millions and it's like and we're not so you know hundreds of millions we have a bank loan every year and that carries us through our busiest time but even we're working towards the end of hopefully never having to have that again that's only started again since the pandemic so but it's paid off Christmas which is our peak season so that's the way to manage it you take that short-term loan when you need it when you need to invest in all your raw materials whatever they are for whatever business you're doing and then you pay it back when it's return time so for us that's Christmas

23:07Alex Chisnall:And how come or how has that served you so well, like growing organically? And you had at the time, as you say, that this vision, which was literally just like the M25, but obviously 50, 53, 54, 55 countries later, over 40 years, I guess you said? 30 years lush. Yeah. 30 is lush okay um yeah how's how have you been able to do that um and and what kind of numbers did you did you go like in kind of you know clumps of years like every five years or how did that kind of go how did that curve look i don't know if it was so much a curve as a wavy line because you would do um yeah we we decided okay we'll we'll go abroad and we'll do um we'll do shops abroad this because Canada and Croatia seem to be working so then you'd get quite a few people coming in and it'd be up opening quite a lot you know and for me that was great fun because I absolutely love to travel the other founders luckily for me don't it's not their big thing but for me it is so I could get to be in charge of expansion from that point of view from new countries so we'd go and have like oh opening five new countries in a year and then maybe the year after only one and then and then we're the shops are coming along we're looking for the areas where they can be but we're funding our own shop opening rather than asking for money in again and I think because that's organic you actually keep a grip on your business I always I would be quite frightened even knowing what I know now for suddenly to have an investor come in and give me loads of money and say right now you can take it from 100 shops to 800 shops or you know and just go for it and he's like but I wouldn't know how to run 800 shops from 100 shops and I think that's what people must think you know please think of that because however exciting and sexy that sounds the reality is you've got to run that business and if you haven't learned how to run an 800 shot business and you go from 100 to 800 that's a recipe for disaster you're then going to be bringing in people out of desperation maybe to work with there's a lot of pitfalls I could see doing that but I think for us yeah we have enough challenges as it is but it's but because it's organic growth every time you open something you're opening it it's one step forward.

25:49You're not running a mile and not knowing what you're running into.

25:52Alex Chisnall:If you're enjoying this conversation and thinking, I need to be around more people like this, then I've got the perfect solution for you. The Festival of Entrepreneurs is where 5 to 10 ,000 ambitious entrepreneurs come together to learn from the people who've actually done it. It's on October the 8th and 9th at the NEC in Birmingham, and I'm giving my listeners free two-day passes real entrepreneurs real stories real strategies exactly like what you're hearing right now but live and in person go to festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk and get your free two-day pass before they're gone do you know what my biggest day of learning and you know 16 years in business is when i had um sports injury clinics and we literally just went from one at the little down center in bournemouth which was which i didn't know at the time but was the second busiest leisure center in the uk so it's just like non-stop traffic and then offer the opportunity to then open a clinic in sandbanks another one somewhere else in pool another two in bournemouth and i just went wow this is amazing yeah let's do it you know went for it record you know recruited a load of people and then there's like oh these leisure centers there's just no traffic and then you're robbing peter to pay poor and then you're running all of these you know discounted you know remember all those deal sites you used to be able to like buy something and before you know it as you said the margin there is no margin and you're literally like you're saying taking it from the the golden goose at the in Bournemouth at the little down and for me you can see people who look at that exactly as you say and think oh this is amazing I could literally have a thousand shops in 10 years let's go for it now 100 a year and you just like just literally work things out take advice from those who've been there before um and think very carefully about what's this how's this going to impact your lifestyle as well in your family and and all of those kinds of things well and and like you said not each location works the same not all our shops work the same we will have shops that aren't profitable but thankfully we have more that are so and you know and things do carry in the countries we're in so our main countries really America, Canada, so North America, UK, Japan, and Korea as a partner's country.

28:04But those four countries at different times are up and down. So, you know, the minute, Japan not doing so well. But it's okay, because the UK and North America are, so it supports them. There was a time where Japan was supporting us so you know as long as you can keep the balance that's okay but it's about recognizing when somewhere isn't working and thinking right why isn't it working going through all your options because it never looks good to close things because that makes people think maybe it's not as good as think it is so will I go there no so it doesn't look good to close things but you've got to look at it and think right well is the manager right is the staffing right is the offering right for that area are we in the right location has the foot traffic moved you know is is little down center still the second busiest I don't know is somebody else overtaking it yeah you've it's you've you've got to look at all of those things and make sure that all of those things are right before you go in my opinion before you go okay we've tried everything Jane it's you know it's got to go we've got to give up on that one and we'll move somewhere else um yeah it's business is fascinating isn't it because it's not a single conscious stream of thought it's a thousand things going on all at the same time it's all the threads and you know sometimes some threads are sort of slipping away and you've got to pull them back in and you don't look at those and and then others you've got it you've got to pay attention to all bits and so that by then, of course, your teams do grow and you employ more people because you've got to because you can't keep doing it all as it gets bigger.

29:54Alex Chisnall:How many people do you think you have working for Lush now? Is it going to be first and secondary, isn't there, like number of people that are? Around the world, it's 18 ,000. Whoa. Around that. And then that expands up to 19, 20 when Christmas. so we start taking on people from July August and that's throughout the manufacturing and through stores because you need more people on the floor but that's the other thing you know we're very passionate about giving people good advice when they come in so we need enough people on the floor so you know people say to us why do you use fresh ingredients why do you make things by hand why do you have so many people on your shop floor all of those things people would automatically take out because that eats into your margin but that is why we have a business because we are going to help you choose the right product we don't want you to come in buy product and then go away and thought oh well I thought it'd be all right but it isn't and it hasn't worked for me oh I'm not going back there again because that product didn't work no you didn't have the right one whereas if you spoke to somebody if we have enough people to speak to you we would find you the product for the need that you have and that's what's you know that's what's important is it so it's sort of um we we believe in using fresh ingredients because they're the most effective they've still got enzymes they've still got all the things in them that make a difference to your hair and your skin you know so we believe in making using these beautiful ingredients because that's going to make a difference to the finished product to the effect it has on the customer when they use it and we believe in handmade because we want to give people jobs as well and if you've got you can just stick everything in a machine and it's very bland or you can have people making it and then sticking their faces on that say look what I've done mum you know and and they love it those faces on our pots aren't real people and it's a joy to see so many people coming to work Would you want to be in, well, there are factories, in a factory with like five people in that are just pressing the on switch and really not, you don't have any conversation because you're not, somebody else is at the other end of the room, you don't see them, you have your coffee break on your own.

32:14That's soulless. You come into one of our buildings and it's full of people, banter, laughter, working together, supporting each other, passing things to each other, moving things along, taking the next phase. It's just, you know, and people will always have a smile for you. And it's, you know, that's pleasure. I mean, obviously, I like with everything. Everything is not, does not suit everybody. But if you like people, you probably like working here. It's really quite nice.

32:46Alex Chisnall:And it's obviously one of the things that differentiates you and Lush. what do you think is anything held you back over the last 30 years maybe our animal testing policy and some of our ethics but only in so much as we refuse to lower our standards no matter how how much further we get into the business we believe ethical statements the beginning has remained the same and we don't change that we only add to it we added in the we believe in the freedom of movement the right to freedom of movement so we only ever add to it it would make life easier it's another thing we could take out you know we only buy our raw materials from um people who do not test on animals on who pay fair wages and and you know all those necessary things now if we stop that we could get cheaper raw materials but we will not stop that no it's correct and we you know we have two prizes we have the lush prize and the spring prize um the lush prize is all about supporting people that are looking for alternative ways to testing for products that are for ingredients in a safer way than on animals animals don't give you a safe result so you know that is really important so we have a campaign we have prizes for that we have a prize she's going on this week about the spring prize which is all about people who are making a difference to the environment to truly are leaving our planet lusher than they found it to the way they're growing things, to the way they're producing, to the way they're educating, to the way they're bringing people together.

34:18And we have our charitable arm as our charitable giving, where we give at the moment is 75 percent of everything that we make from a product that we sell for a particular cause goes to that cause. So we find causes that we want to work with and they they are grassroots ones because there you can make a bigger difference. You're working with people who have the same passion as you do for what you do. They have that passion for what they do. So we don't give it to big companies. We're looking, the big charities, we're looking at small grassroots ones. And we're drawing attention to things that we think people should know and giving them an education.

34:55We're just telling them about it. We're not telling them how to think about it. We're giving them an informed decision. And those are things that make people actually want to work for you. So have things in your business that make people want to be part of your business. Have an ethic, have a moral, have a code that people can identify with and think, Jill, I want to be part of that because I really like that. That's what I would like to stand up for. And it doesn't matter what it is in a positive way, but have one so that people can feel a part of the business. People here own, in their heart, own Lush when they're here.

35:36They feel part of the family. And that's the important thing. have a business where people feel part of it we don't have offices where the doors are shut and people knock on them we're not full of our own self-importance you know we we're still you know I'm Rowena or Ro 21 it's Mark it's Mo it's you know you can come in give me a hug whenever you like you can I'll sit and have coffee it's like we're all just part of it because we're all in it together and I wish you can imagine a lot of people are going and but it's it's what's so important to make people feel you know they are actually part of the business and that I think is

36:14Alex Chisnall:what makes it a success at what point um like going back early early stages again did you um you know what was the screw it just do it moment where you literally went I'm all in because you had that that failure it sounds like that happened really early on for you then yeah I would have well I would have been in 11 years in I swear 14 years working with Mark because it's yeah 44 so so for me I mean you know we have one of our founders now his he's a newer founder but he worked for this through cosmetics to go and through constantine and we're so when he came back to us it was lovely but for him he couldn't join us straight away because he had a young family and had to find a proper job you know for me I was single didn't matter I had a credit card I was just like and I had all the love and respect for Mark and Mo and Liz because I'd worked with them for 14 years and I just thought do you know if you want me to work with you I'd really still love to work with you and so I used my credit card and and yeah bought things for the business needed to sort of keep in so yeah it took me a while to pay that back but it didn't matter that was my investment that was I didn't have any money I'm notorious for spending all my money but it is so but I did have a credit card and I could use that to buy raw materials or things for the shop paint whatever um and it was just sort of like yeah do I go and find a proper job do I you know hope that Pair Lindstrand will reconsider me for being a balloon pilot or do I just think you know what screw it just do it join in with the people you know and love and and have it give it another good go you know because it could work out this time and I think the other thing I would say it's like when you're if you want to join the team of people don't join join like-minded but not like skilled the the six of us at beginning all very different you know one was all into nurture and training one is like all to the detail of a product one has got the vision of how we can move things forward one was into manufacturing one is into all the tech and then there's me or give it a go with anything jack of all trades master of none really but it served me quite well so it you know it's five of them when you're finding all those skills each one of you have that important part to play and is supportive of the others and supported by the other.

38:45And any times that you've nearly given up any like setbacks or you've

38:53Alex Chisnall:actually like reconsidered or it doesn't sound like but. As a group we've never wanted to give up the business we'd like it to be you know we could we could sell out and just take the money in the run I don't think that's really very likely we want it to be a company business we've set up an EBT which is an employment benefit trust where we each put some of our shares into that so that the employees once you've been here a year you're part I think it's here you've been you're part of the business um and you have a vote then so should any big decisions be taken for the business you would have that vote for it it wouldn't just be the shareholders we want that we want our business to continue beyond us we're all getting to retirement age though none of you know I think sometimes you think oh yeah me I just think I wouldn't mind just selling up and then just traveling the world and then I think yeah but I would by the time I'd done all the gardening that I'd like to do done all the housework that I think I should do and done all the travels and ticked off the places I really want to go to I'd be like I really miss everyone and I know I would really miss everybody I'd miss the whole the energy of the business the challenges of a business the people in the business I would really miss it and I think we're all feeling the same you know each one of us would think oh we could retire now but we don't interesting isn't it because a lot of people from the outside looking in would be like um at some point you would yeah You would want to set a date and go, this date, we sell up.

40:30But there's legacy tied into that as well.

40:35Alex Chisnall:I've been doing it for as many decades as you guys have been doing it and you enjoy coming to work every day. I speak to that many people and they're like, well, why would I want to stop? It's the best job in the world. I mean, I have set two dates. I've been here 40 years. That sounds like a good time to go. I'm still here four years later. I've just been 60. I think I'll retire five years I'm still here I'm not going anywhere it's you know it's just like a fit of peaks I'm going to think oh I'm a bit tired and grumpy this morning sod it I'm just going to I'll set this day and I'll just go it's actually not possible once you're in and people leave and then come back you know they think oh I'm going to go and work I walked past somebody in the in the one of the rooms the other day and I thought oh look there she is I waved.