How would you describe Spice Kitchen to a 3-year-old?

Spice Kitchen believes it is really important for families to spend time together at mealtimes, and so we create exciting, colourful spice collections that everyone loves. We are passionate about introducing people to flavours from all around the world so that we can all learn more about one another’s culture and heritage.

What is the story behind Spice Kitchen? 

This is a legendary story we regularly remind ourselves of! 

Spice Kitchen was born in a relaxed chat over the dining table on Christmas Day in 2012. Shashi (AKA Mamma Spice) had just retired and was looking for a little project or hobby. I (Sanjay) suggested that she try selling a Masala Dabba on eBay. She liked the idea and so we gathered the ingredients and put one up for sale. It went immediately. So, we did another. And another. Then, we got a massive order for 10,000 tins and suddenly all hands were on deck, blending and grinding spices. And we haven’t stopped since. 

Coming to the present day, we now have two distribution units, an ever-expanding team and a wonderful array of products that our customers love! It’s been such an incredible, unexpected journey and we are all having a blast.

What is the most difficult aspect of running your own company?

Up until quite recently, I had a relatively small team and was juggling lots of balls, as well as wanting to spend quality time with my wife and two-year-old daughter. 

Bringing in the right people is always a challenge for any company, but especially when it’s a small family business. I’ve been so fortunate recently that – having taken the decision to expand – the people I’ve brought in have slotted into position and are really passionate about the brand. It makes a massive difference and I’m loving having more team members around to share the load!

Tell us a curious fact or an anecdote related to Spice Kitchen.

Everyone who works with me (and even those who don’t) knows that I will stop any conversation to answer the phone to a customer. So, I can be in the middle of a business meeting, but if a customer calls with a question about a spice, I’m taking that call. For me, answering that call is the most important thing I am going to do that day. I’ve always stuck to that philosophy in business and so far, it’s never let me down.

Spice Kitchen is given $1 million; how would you spend/invest?

There are probably many more glamorous answers to this question, but for me, I would probably look at introducing some of the best staff benefits that I could find. I’m very aware that a business is only as good as its people, and so I’m really keen to ensure that I take care of the people that make Spice Kitchen possible.

Where is Spice Kitchen headed now? What’s the next big thing you’re striving to achieve?

I recently joked that I would like a spice tin in every kitchen, but the reality is not far from that. 

When you’ve tasted really good spices, there’s no going back, and so I want everyone to be able to experience the difference that these incredible ingredients can make to their recipes. 

We are right in the middle of some incredible growth. With lockdown, many people started to cook at home again and so our products were flying off the shelves. So, in the middle of upscaling our distribution, we are also in the process of creating recipe guides for all of our spice tins and (deep breath) doing some serious work in creating our very own Spice Kitchen cookbook. Watch this space!

Connect and do business with Spice Kitchen on Enterprise League

Meet our incredible member, Koala Rank, a B2B content marketing agency like no other. We asked their Founder, Arrigo Lupori, to share the story behind the company, and the enthusiasm and professionalism we witnessed were unheard of.  

So if you need a fresh perspective and guidance for your blog and overall content marketing, reach out to them on Enterprise League ASAP.

How would you describe Koala Rank to a 3-year-old?

Koala Rank is like a koala climbing up a tree: it takes them a lot of effort to get to the top but once they’re up there, they can stay there for a long, long time (and reap the benefits!). It’s the same when you create content for a website: there’s a lot of work done beforehand so that you can eat and sleep happily for a long, long time.

What is the story behind Koala Rank?

Like most companies, Koala Rank was born from frustration. I was working as a freelance content writer for a long time and couldn’t help but notice that my work was absolutely useless. Clients were happy but they didn’t really understand what it meant to create content that brought results (i.e. money). So I decided to change that. Today, Koala Rank offers a complete package that takes you from no traffic whatsoever to making sales. And it does so with continuous care for our clients’ education.

How is Koala Rank different from your competitors? What is your unique selling point?

This was a bit hard to identify as I first started out building Koala Rank, but it’s clear to me now: it’s all about user experience. In fact, Koala Rank doesn’t provide you with just the content you need to rank high on Google and make an impact on your future customers; it also provides you with all the components of an incredible online reading experience, one that a reader feels totally engaged with, from top to bottom. This comes in the form of UX design, mostly done on WordPress but also on other platforms.

What is the most difficult aspect of running your own company?

The most difficult aspect at the moment is getting out of the feast and famine cycle where you get one really good client and then nothing for weeks. That’s because the company is still really small and there isn’t enough bandwidth to manage a continuous stream of customers coming in. The service also requires a few adjustments before that can become a reality which is something I’m already working on.

Tell us a curious fact or an anecdote related to Koala Rank.

One of the questions I get the most about my company is why I chose to name it after a koala. People give me all kinds of weird looks (and even smiles!) when I tell them that and I see that it makes an impression on them. So, why a koala? 

Because of two reasons mostly: 

1) it’s been demonstrated that animals are easy to remember and that people have a positive attitude towards these kind creatures, so using them in branding only makes sense as they make everything more approachable and fun (think about Mailchimp, HostGator, Hootsuite, TestGorilla, and even more creative approaches like OptinMonster), and; 

2) RK are the initials of an old nickname that I used to have online but Rankin’Koala didn’t sound good to me so I just swapped them around.

Koala Rank is given $1 million, how would you spend/invest them?

One million is a lot of money. Koala Rank is a tiny bootstrapped startup that doesn’t even need that much investment to “thrive.” With that said, if I was given $1M, here’s what I would do: immediately hire two/three people to help me out internally, focus on having them onboarded appropriately and happy with their position. 

Then, make sure all the SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures) are in place so that we can scale operations once we get to full-blown marketing efforts. Iterate on the service with a few betas offered for a discount or on partnership bases to understand which parts of the service need refinement. Gather feedback and improve it until we reach product market fit. 

Then establish a complete messaging platform based on our positioning and restyle our visual identity from scratch based on it. Have a sound content process in place for all the most important touchpoints (website, social, ads, etc.), and then probably hire a few more people to handle the huge marketing effort that will come out of that. 

Set quarterly goals and iterate quarter by quarter to become profitable.

Where is Koala Rank headed now? What’s the next big thing you’re striving to achieve?

The next big thing is product-market fit. I’m understanding what my clients want through direct feedback and I’m also gathering a few reviews. That will help us improve our reputation and make a name for ourselves in the content marketing industry. Currently I’m working on a restructuring of the service based on all the feedback I’ve gathered and that will come with new assets as well. Excited to release more information soon!

How would you describe Tekrevol to a 3-year-old?

Tekrevol is an app development company. We develop mobile apps in different industries such as social media apps like Instagram and Facebook, or game apps like Candy Crush, or apps on which you can buy and sell things you own or produce.

We make apps that work on both Android and iOS and specialize in creating apps for businesses so that they can reach out to interested customers through mobile phones.

What is the story behind Tekrevol?

We started Tekrevol in a small bedroom. We were two people who had the urge to create something that can help people across the globe and solve problems faced by people in society through our expertise in technology. Be it businesses, non-profit organizations, or individuals who are passionate about entrepreneurship but don’t have the technical skills required to leverage technology the same way as big corporations do. As such, the name Tekrevol is a combination of “Tek” which stands for technology and “Revol” which stands for revolution.

The story behind Tekrevol is simple; we understood the struggles of starting a business and then scaling it, so we decided to do something that can help ease that process for others through our tech support. This is what we refer to as the Revol way

How is Tekrevol different from your competitors? What is your unique selling point?

We don’t position ourselves in the industry as just an app development company, but also as a tech partner to businesses. Developing an application is only the practical aspect of the business, but we work side by side our clients to also ensure that their business can achieve maximum growth and scalability through growth-hacking.

As experts in growth hacking ourselves, we act as both the tech support and as consultants to ensure that our clients are more than just apps in our portfolio but companies that we’ve worked alongside from their formation to their eventual break as an industry leader.

Tell us a curious fact or an anecdote related to Tekrevol.

Whenever we’re planning a sprint or a plan, especially in marketing, we have open discussions with all team members putting in their thoughts, and we have no limit to crazy. We might not implement “crazy” all the time, but we do entertain out-of-the-box completely crazy ideas and keep them in our books.

At first, this brought a random element of humour to our meetings, but now we’ve actually started to list these completely absurd ideas that come up in the meeting and document them separately. In the middle of the sprints, we then revisit these ideas and have a conversation specifically on them, to identify the results we’re lacking and which of these ideas we can use or mould to get those results. All of this started simply because our employees and the culture we have at Tekrevol is all about creativity and out-of-the-box thinking, and our team members never feel hesitant to share their thoughts, even if they sound absurd.

We’ve found that more often than not, these crazy ideas that sound incredibly random have some wisdom in them, and if you can bisect the idea and extract that wisdom, with a bit of tweaking, it can add a bit of genius to your overall marketing strategy.

So we’ve now started documenting completely crazy ideas that you’d usually dismiss, and we have a list of them both that have been used and implemented to those that we’re going to be using for the future.

Tekrevol is given $1 million, how would you spend/invest them?

Infrastructure and presence are what we’re looking to scale, and that’s where I would spend a million dollars. In terms of infrastructure, I mean both our technical infrastructure, which includes technology investments but also our internal infrastructure that directly impacts our resources, such as training and benefits. By investing both of these, we would ensure that our clients and our own resources feel happy and satisfied with being associated with us as an organization.

When it comes to presence, I mean both from a digital and a physical perspective. Expanding our digital presence and improving our overall company branding is something that will require significant investments. From penetrating communities and spaces from where we can reach out to our target audience in the most meaningful way to actually having physical offices across the United States and beyond is where I see myself investing a million dollars.

Where is Tekrevol headed now? What’s the next big thing you’re striving to achieve?

The next big step for the company is definitely the launch of our New York office. Today, we are located in Houston and San Francisco within the US, and we are soon expanding our portfolio of physical offices to New York. We’re looking to expand our offices to become a lot more accessible to our clients and provide a more personalized experience to clients dealing with us.

Hopefully, that way we can grow as a company and work a lot more closely with our clients, something that becomes a possibility with a new physical location.

Athena was born from Zeus’ head after he suffered a severe headache. How was Get Ahead VA born?

After a corporate career in buying for retail giants such as Superdrug and Sainsburys, I was looking for a flexible work solution that could fit around my three daughters – now 18, 16 and 14. Having grown up with a successfully self-employed mother, I knew it was possible to be able to contribute financially to the family and to do school drop off and pick-ups too. My mum was a great example and I grew up knowing that I wanted one day to run my own business just like she did. 

Once my youngest started school in 2010, the time was right to start something for me. I looked at various business ideas and the way the employment landscape was shaping up for the future. A virtual assistance business seemed to offer the best solution. I have always loved networking, which is such a big part of my role now.

How would you describe Get Ahead VA to a 3 year old?

At Get Ahead VA we help businesses and the people who run them to do what they are good at. Our team of over 40 helpers take on the things that they can’t do, don’t want to do, or don’t have time to do, so they can get back to what they like best.

Why is Get Ahead VA different from the rest?

Our business is totally flexible. That’s the reason I set it up in the first place so that I could work flexibly around my children. All of our VAs work flexibly and remotely. Many of them are also mothers who have decades of experience in their field yet struggled to find meaningful part-time or flexible work. Working for Get Ahead VA allows them to use their significant skills yet work flexibly around their families. 

All of our clients pay for our services in a flexible way, so that they only pay for exactly the skills they need, when they need them. We don’t have minimum contracts or tie ins. Our clients simply work with us on an hourly, project or ongoing basis – whatever is best for their business. 

We’ve won awards for our commitment to flexible working including winning the Flexible Business of the Year in the Mum and Working Awards which is something I am very proud of. I have also recently been selected onto the #ialso100 – a list of 100 inspiring female leaders across the UK, and we have been shortlisted in awards for Talent Attraction, Networking and regional company of the year awards.

Get Ahead VA is given $1 million, how would you spend/invest?

Wow! That’s a tricky one. I think I would use it to invest in physical offices and a co-working space. Whilst I love the fact that our business is virtual, I am also a fan of co-working and collaboration, so it would be great to create our own space and welcome other businesses. Face-to-face communication can really help build business relationships.

Get Ahead VA is given $1 million, how would you spend/invest?

Wow! That’s a tricky one. I think I would use it to invest in physical offices and a co-working space. Whilst I love the fact that our business is virtual, I am also a fan of co-working and collaboration, so it would be great to create our own space and welcome other businesses. Face-to-face communication can really help build business relationships.

Where is Get Ahead VA headed now? What’s the next big thing you’re striving to achieve?

Right now, I am focussed on growing our franchise network across the UK. We already have regional directors in place across Newcastle, Leeds, Reading, West Surrey and South Yorkshire. I really enjoy bringing new franchisees on board and helping them to achieve their dream of running their own successful business, whilst being there to support them every step of the way. 

We talk about going into business for yourself, but not by yourself. All of our regional directors are part of our team and we all work together to share expertise and support each other. It took a lot of hard work to get the franchise offering just right but seeing our franchisees enjoying running their own businesses and being able to mentor them makes it all worthwhile.

With today’s experience, what advice would you give to yourself on your first day as a business owner?

Don’t be afraid to ask for help. In the beginning, I wanted people to think I was an expert. That I knew it all. Which of course I didn’t! Actually, I have found that asking for help can be a great relationship builder. It can open up conversations and gain people’s trust, which is an essential part of any positive working relationship.

On the flip side, don’t always trust that everyone who claims to be an expert. For example, I worked with a few different accountants until I finally found a company that understands my objectives and supports me in achieving my goals, as well as working in a way that suits me.

How would your employees describe you?

I would like to think they would describe me as passionate, positive, straight-talking and supportive.  I feel lucky to have met so many great people since I started my business and have such a talented team working for me as both team members and franchisees. It’s been a pleasure to meet every one of them and welcome them on board.

  Rebecca Newenham, Founder & Director of Get Ahead VA

It’s Women’s History Month – name 3 ladies who inspire you to be a better leader and tell us how and why?

My mother has always been an inspiration to me. She showed me it was possible to work flexibly and run your own business around your family. That’s the ethos of how I run the business how. I love what I do, but I always remember the reason I set it up in the first place. Family comes first.

I think Michelle Obama is a real inspiration to any woman. Her ‘Becoming’ book made me think about finding my own voice and being true to myself as a leader. 

Karen Brady also inspires me to be a better leader. Over the years I think she has become one of the highest-profile, most respected female business leaders whilst raising her two children. She is passionate about supporting women in business and has a strong belief that hard work and ambition can make any dream a reality. I love her can-do attitude, encapsulated in her quote: “You can’t determine where you start in life, but you can determine where you end up.

You’re the only woman entrepreneur in a room full of men talking business – how does that unfold?

Throughout my career, I have worked and networked with both men and women so this wouldn’t faze me. Whilst men and women bring different qualities to the workplace, there are also plenty of similarities and much common ground. The topics we discussed might be different from a room full of women talking business, there would still be much to talk about and learn from each other.

As a closure, which business lesson would you like to share with other entrepreneurs?

Losing my first team member was a hard lesson to learn. At the time, she told me she was going to work for one of my clients and I was surprised and upset. Not only was I losing a valued member of my team – but I was also losing a client too. It was a situation I had never experienced before and at the time, something I took quite personally. 

But as I reflected on it, I realized that actually, losing that member of staff was a compliment. Through our business, we had established a need in our client’s business and fulfilled it. We had fulfilled it so well that they wanted to continue it on a permanent basis. We had enabled the business to grow to a point where they were confident enough to take on a permanent member of staff. It was an example of our success – not our failure. An opportunity for future growth, not a step backward.

It taught me the importance of a positive growth mindset. I learned a valuable lesson about being a successful business owner by being able to see long term benefits as well as short term gains or losses  and being able to find the strength to overcome challenges and believe in a positive future.

Athena was born from Zeus’ head after he suffered a severe headache. How was OggaDoon born?

After many years of rumination! I didn’t take a straight line to being an entrepreneur because I am, at heart, a storyteller and it’s those skills that have taken me on this interesting adventure and who knows where next. 

After turning around a wine bar from loss to profit in less than a year at the age of twenty-five, I knew I wanted to make a difference through my entrepreneurial skills. After being a partner in an environmental comms firm, I recognized two things: that there needed to be more focus on the world we lived on and how we could save it, and that I wanted to do comms differently.

OggaDoon was born: an ethical guerrilla comms business dedicated to working with brands with passion and purpose. I have built the business to deliver globally to clients of all sizes.

How would you describe OggaDoon to a 3 year old?

OggaDoon tells the stories of companies and people in them that are doing good in the world. Some of those companies are building sustainable houses, some are helping cities to save the planet, and some are helping us to understand our bodies more. No matter who we work with, they need to love what they do.

Why is OggaDoon different from the rest?

The phrase ‘ethical marketing company’ can make people raise their eyebrows, but I don’t see any conflict in accelerating a brand’s growth through sharing impact, and holding to strong ethical values. It’s why we work with businesses with passion and purpose, and why we keep to very strong environmental actions: working in an office that uses renewable energy and rainwater in plumbing, going paperless over 8 years ago, and rewarding team members with extra holiday days if they don’t fly. We’re also underestimated at times. Whether you meet us in our London or Bristol offices, we punch well above our weight for the team size, because I have outstanding people in the business.

OggaDoon is given $1 million, how would you spend/invest?

Ohhh, great question! The natural bon viveur in me would say celebration.

The business Caroline says the first stage is to give 10% to one of my favorite green charities – it wouldn’t feel right hanging onto all of that when the world is burning, flooding, and literally being destroyed by human actions. 

Then I think I’d reward the team with a little something. We work hard and a work/life balance is critical to me, and so I’d like to thank them directly. 

Lastly, if the business doesn’t need investment, it would be becoming a comms/marketing partner and investor to a number of startups that just have the edge.

Where is OggaDoon headed now? What’s the next big thing you’re striving to achieve?

We’re in the middle of a big growth spurt, with our reach spread across the UK and further afield. We’re working with some seriously interesting  brands in cybersecurity, healthtech, and edtech, green tech and prop tech five areas of ‘tech for good’ that I’m really passionate about as well as exciting businesses in the green space and those led by social value

I think the next big thing I’m striving to achieve is maintaining the happiness in the team, and using new technologies to measure the successful impact to our clients. It’s all to contribute to becoming a recognised leading business in guerrilla marketing and PR.

With today’s experience, what advice would you give to yourself on your first day as a business owner?

Caroline: You were right. Sustainability and clever technologies that empower sustainable changes are absolutely the future. You may have spotted this earlier than everyone else, and you may feel a little on your own right now, but you are going to see such changes in the world. Soon there will be more businesses than you can count trying to make a positive difference, and you’re going to be in the heart of it all. Also, just do it.

How would your employees describe you?

It’s a strange position, being an entrepreneur: you work so closely with your team, seeing them more hours in the day than your significant other!

I think my employees would describe me as passionate, driven, detailed, an observer of life with social witticisms and a food-lover. And dog-lover as well, of course – Bonnie the dog is our intern.

  Caroline Macdonald, CEO and Founder of OggaDoon 

It’s Women’s History Month – name 3 ladies who inspire you to be a better leader and tell us how and why?

Clearly number one is my Mum. She achieved so much and without a fuss or fanfare. She taught me to simply go on about my business, that anything is achievable.

Queen Elizabeth II. I’m not particularly a royalist nor a republican but this woman has shown tremendous leadership, not always getting it right, but she is progressive and cool. You have to admire her qualities of a steady hand on a ship that is rocky at times.

Jasmin Paris. Breastfeeding whilst winning a tough terrain race shows you what you can achieve if you put your mind to it.

You’re the only woman entrepreneur in a room full of men talking business – how does that unfold?

Just like any other meeting; it’s pretty commonplace for me. Actually, running a wine bar set me up. Frequently, the customers would become merry, shall we say, and at times, some of the men became belligerent. Using the feminine guile, I diffused many situations that could have escalated. Now in a room full of men talking business, it’s good fun. You engage with a few light touch questions, then go in for the killer inquisition. Then they know you know your stuff.

I think I’ve been fortunate. In the almost ten years of running my own business, I’ve never been treated badly simply based on my gender – but then, I think that’s because our results speak for themselves.