Business Link

My last entry was back in 2007. A time when the business was
up and running and we were just launching O2GO into the national supermarkets.
A couple of minor things have changed.

Just after my last blog, I had a phone call from my
packaging company who liked the product and wanted to buy the business.
Fantastic. The deal was set up to allow all the shareholders to exit the
business and for myself to use my own share to buy into a new Joint Venture
with the majority owners in a 25% / 75% split. I was not ready to let the
business go at this stage and felt that the product and opportunity would be
worth more in the long run.

The deal was done very quickly and I found myself with a 2
year contract to stay with the business, a Board position with the Joint
Venture, some cash in my back pocket and 25% of a growing business. Everything
looked positive running into 2008.

Then the letter arrived from the legal team of one of the
worlds largest mobile phone companies.

The nameless mobile network operator thought that the first
few letters of our O2GO logo resembled too closely their logo for a mobile
telephony service. As we are in the powdered drinks industry, I found this a
bit strange Anyway we conceded that if we were taken to task then they
definitely had more money than we did so it was better to save the money, time
and effort and get on with a brand redesign. Don't get me wrong, we still own
the trademark and we argued and argued about the validity of the opposition to
the trademark but all things considered we walked away.

We asked 3 companies to pitch for a new brand name, overall
redesign and packaging. Very exciting times as previously I had done all of
this myself but now we had backers with some financial muscle who believed in
the opportunity, we could start to pay for professional help rather than do it
all myself.

We chose the name WAHOO as it embodied everything we wanted
the drink to be, fun, exciting, different and unique and the new packaging
reflects this attitude. It actually took 8 months to redesign the product so we
took the opportunity to redesign the formula to create a better tasting
functional on the go drink with fewer calories in it. This took us to Autumn 2008
where I proceeded to sell the new WAHOO into the supermarkets and starting 2009
the product has been listed in Asda, Waitrose and Morrisons and is doing very
well indeed.

I am proud that I was right 5 years ago. People do want to
drink more water, they are tired of expensive bottled waters and are refilling
from the tap and water cooler. In fact my wife can’t stand it that I was right
but is very proud seeing our products on the supermarkets shelves.

During the past 2 years I have written a couple of books.
The first was easy as I used to negotiate Exhibition space with public speaking
opportunities. If they would give me a cheaper stand then I would do a free
seminar on entrepreneurship and business startups with my top 10 tips for
business. These top 10 tips became 100 and I managed to find a publisher who
subsequently published “100 All-Time essentials for entrepreneurs”
– which is available on-line and in all Good Bookstores. Weirdly I get emails
from people all over the world saying how they like the book and how it has
helped them move their ideas forward. The second book is “FREESOURCING: how to
start a business with no money” and is out in October. Its about starting a business with no money – something I have done and carried
forward the tenets of into the new organisation.

The past couple of years have been very busy but I am still
an entrepreneur and I am still involved in the day to day problem solving that
a growing business brings.

In the coming blogs I want to detail the new issues I have
and touch on some insights into creativity, flexibilty and speed – the three
pillars of successful business.