Richard Pakey’s Post

Transcript

18 months in, we're already in profit. I still can't believe it, to be honest, of how much money people are willing to pay us. They were fighting over the dance floor. We didn't know they were fighting over it would be a murder on the dance floor. Hi, I'm Becky Stevens and I'm Matt Stevens and we have the party tent company, Birmingham franchise and we've owned this now for 18 months. The thought of running a business has always appealed to me, but I just didn't know where to start. I've got no other skills than what I've done for all of my career, which has been a nurse working through COVID in healthcare was not very nice whatsoever. And I think that the the momentum for Becky wanting to start a business, it really got a lot stronger from that, didn't it? And I was quite resistant to it, obviously working for the NHS. For so long it's quite comfortable to just just carry on in the job, isn't it? It was the business side that was my biggest fear and having no clue where to start, what to do. So I signed up to various companies looking at lots of different franchises and I had an e-mail come through and flick past the party down company and it just really intrigued me. I've always looked market he's always wanted to have a marketing. So I shouted through to Mark how about a marquee high franchise And he was like, no, what do we know about Marquis? What do we know about events? That kind of thing just walked off and literally 30 seconds. Actually puts it back round the door and went actually tell me more. The help that we've received has just been amazing really, isn't it? Yeah, From the first time, from the very first finding the advert and the first contact, but since we bought the franchise in, it's been absolutely fantastic. It doesn't matter what questions we've had, what time of day. Yeah, he's there at the end of the phone, ready to help us. He's a real inspiration. He's he's amazing, really. He's got the confidence in us, which has obviously given us confidence in ourselves that we've got to this point. I couldn't imagine needing any more help, really. You couldn't have. And what we've done without the backing of a franchise, but particularly particularly he's just been so helpful pointing us in the right direction, guiding us, giving advice that is by far the most important thing to us and why we chose the franchise. I think that's the only reason that I went in on it as well, was that it was a franchise knowing that we would have that support. Doesn't matter how silly we might think it is or what time of day it is, we can just contact him. This is what you hear from, you know, people that have businesses. Your first two years are hard, you know, not gonna make any money. You're not gonna be able to give up work. You just gonna, you know, put everything back into the business. So that's what we were anticipating and and we've been far busier than we anticipated. I've used all my annual leave for I'd like to reduce my hours. It has been hard work trying to hold down a contract job and do this because of how many bookings that we've had, how popular we've become so quickly. We've covered the cost of our franchise in our first year. We were actually in profit. Now we're gonna start taking away from the company as well, which we didn't expect to do well for at least the first few years, did we? No. We use red blocks on our calendar and our mugs are just blocked out. Red pretty much, yeah. The whole of the summer we were sold out in July, August, again the same. We're actually turning bookings down and that's having bought 3 marquees extra with water and another dance floor. So we've got two dance floors now as well as the stuff we didn't think we'd use the dance. Or at all, really. But the bookings for that dance floor alone sort of justified the cost of having another, of buying another one was actually trying to outbid each other on it. One weekend they were fighting over the dance floor. We didn't know they were fighting over. It would be a murder on the dance floor. It's a real leap of faith, but the backing and the support that we've had from the franchise has just been so comforting all along, isn't it? Knowing that it's there and Becky shows me the takings for per month. I still gone believe it to be honest. And how much money people are willing to pay us. The great thing with franchise is it's a format that's working and Ian's been doing the Marquis for a long time. We followed exactly what he's been doing. We've followed his guidance and. Working 18 months in, we're already in profit. Must stopped working. I'm ready to give up my shifts. It's working, and that's just by following what Ian's already built up and learn.