Young Guns by Christopher Nye

BUSINESS

Young Guns

It’s all happening in Southampton! Meet seven young entrepreneurs who are doing the business in this dynamic city THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN CHRIS MITCHELL – aged 24 Job Title: Director Business: Sqweez commercial juicers. We design and manufacture the coolest, sexiest juicers in the business. They’re black, branded, and the kind of thing that makes a juice bar look great. As Gaggia is to coffee, we are to oranges. Local: From Hampshire Schooling: Local comprehensive. I had dyslexia and always felt I was being treated as a bit of a thickie. The success of my business is my way of proving a point. How did you start in business? Noticed that existing juicers were nasty plastic things. Saved up while working > as a manager at McDonalds, went in with a partner and had some help from the bank too. How successful? We started two years ago, spent a year developing the product, and we’ve sold 100 machines in the past year at around £2,000 each. Where next: We’re now focusing on schools and offices. Amazingly, schools are proving difficult, but large offices in London are rather receptive! www.sqweez.me.uk KATE BEAL – aged 29 Job title: Creative Director [and owner] Business: KMB Productions. A TV production company, which has produced series for ITV Meridian and UKTV, including Pets and their Vets and The Flying Winemaker as well as a host of corporate work and websites. How successful? We employ nine staff and are in the

Words by christopher nye pictures by southampton photographic

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BUSINESS

top 150 production companies in the UK for turnover. Local: Born at Southampton General. Schooling: Local comprehensive, then York University. How did you start in business? As a producer for Meridian. When they moved location I wanted to stay here, and bought some of their equipment. They also commissioned my first two series. Where next: TV is so insecure, so my aim is to have at least one stable long-running series on air. www.kmbproductions.co.uk

Schooling: I went to school and college here. How did you start in business?: When I got married I

YOUNG GUNS UNCOVERED

saw the need for professionals who love people and know how to organise a great party. So I got a Wedding Planner Diploma via the internet and approached the Princes Trust, who gave me a grant. Aims: To make a mark on other people’s lives in the most positive way, by ensuring the biggest day of their lives is the best it can possibly be. Right now I’m looking for franchisees to push the business further. www.partywithshirley.co.uk

WHERE CHRIS BUYS A SMOOTHIE: The Orange Rooms in Vernon Walk. It’s chilled out, the staff are brilliant. It’s the best bar of any description I’ve ever been in. www.orangerooms.co.uk

GRANT LANG – age 25 WILL FRENCH – aged 23 Job Title: Owner Business: Mozzo; the ethical espresso experience. From sourcing the finest organic, fair trade, arabic coffee beans to selling the coffee on the streets of Southampton from wind and solar-powered coffee carts. Local: Born in Surrey, but went to Solent University. Got a job in a pub and never wanted to leave. How did you start in business? An inheritance. Where next? Spreading our brand of ethical coffee to university campuses across the country. Aims: Helping the coffee-drinking public to appreciate espresso, while showing that a catering company can be organic, interactive and artistic. Lifestyle: Hectic, challenging, but fun www.mozzo.co.uk NICOLA SMITH – age 35 Job Title: Director of Body Matters Business: Body Matters offers stress-busting onsite massage for company staff. My team of masseuses visits workplaces to give workers an oil-free, fully-clothed, acupressure massage, specially formulated to get oxygen flowing to the brain; relaxing, but also re-energising. Local: Born and bred in the New Forest. Schooling: Local comprehensive then Farnborough College of Technology. Lifestyle: Two kids, a husband who commutes to London and this business: my feet rarely touch the ground. How did you start in business? The old-fashioned way; I saved up! However, the great thing about this business was the low start-up costs. Aims: For Body Matters to become a well-known brand in the south of England. www.body-matters.info SHIRLEY BARBEARY – age 23 Job Title: Director Business: Mr and Mrs Wedding Consultants, wedding planning. And now, Party with Shirley, organising civil partnerships and event management. Local: Born and bred in a village called Denmead, near Southampton

Job Title: Director Business: Blue Yacht Management. We look after people’s boats for them, from servicing power boat engines to scrubbing the decks of yachts. Our main job is to make the boat safe, and take the hassle out of boat ownership. When busy people come to use their boat, it’s ready and raring to go. Local: Born and bred. Education: A degree in yacht manufacturing and surveying. How did you start in business? Realised, after a series of mediocre jobs on yachts, that the only way to make money from yachting was to have my own business. Used my own savings to start with, then got a £2,500 loan from the Princes Trust. Actually, their mentoring was more important than the cash. Where next: We’re shortly moving into new premises in the marina. www.bluemanagement.co.uk CHLOE ADAMS – age 21 Job Title: General Manager Business: Little Van Gogh. Van Gogh died an unknown pauper. We aim to ensure that the next genius is discovered a little earlier! We find new artists and get their work displayed in public spaces such as offices in return for a commission on sales. Around 5,000 works of art are currently on display across Europe. Local: Sort of – I’ve been here for 10 years, as the daughter of a commercial diver Schooling: Local. I was great at Art, and got 3 A-grade A levels. But decided that going into business was going to be more worthwhile than an Arts degree. Lifestyle: At work I try to exude an air of professional confidence, but at heart I’m still a 21-year-old slob! How got started: I started off by selling my own design tee-shirts, then tried jewellery (actually I still take commissions for jewellery). Then I came across the Little Van Goghs concept a year ago. Aims: To build the business as far as possible – and find the next Van Gogh, of course! www.littlevangogh.co.uk

WHERE SHIRLEY COMMUNES WITH NATURE: Manor Farm Country Park, on the banks of the River Hamble. It’s a peaceful farm run in the old fashioned way, where you can enjoy the animals and get involved. www.hants.gov.uk/countryside/ manorfarm/ WHERE NICOLA TAKES THE KIDS For them, it’s the bowling alley (especially the ice rink outside it during the winter). But for me it’s got to be the New Forest or the beautiful sandy beaches. WHERE GRANT BUYS HIS CLOTHES The Five O Store in East Bargate. It’s local, it was built from scratch just five years ago and is totally cool. WHERE WILL GOES SAILING Traditionally one nips over to Cowes for lunch, but I like to sail round to Yarmouth, which is a quaint little harbour with a really great pub called The George.

outhampton is a city that likes to roll up its sleeves and get working. It’s not as trendy as Brighton just along the coast, nor has it the historical tourist traps of neighbouring Portsmouth, but it more than makes up for that in a no-nonsense, can-do attitude, backed up by real advantages for those doing business here. Those advantages include the most important port in the south of England, and an impressive international airport. Boats and planes are in the city’s blood; most people know that the Titanic sailed from here in 1912, but not everyone knows that the Supermarine Spitfire was developed and built here. Sadly, the Luftwaffe were in on the secret and much of the town was flattened in 1940, taking with it most of its former medieval and Georgian architectural splendour, but leaving enough to give a flavour of a city whose history goes back to the Stone Age. Southampton first became an important settlement as a link between the Roman Empire and its bases at Winchester and Salisbury. Then it was at the heart of the Saxon world, (it was Southampton’s tides that King Canute attempted to turn back), and 400 years later the ancient Red Lion pub was the scene of the plot to oust Henry V before the Battle of Agincourt. The “Southampton Plot” was betrayed and the ringleaders beheaded outside the Bargate, which still stands today. But such bloodthirsty diversions aside, trade is what Southampton is and has always been about: trade between Rome and its chilly northern dominion, trade between Normandy and William the Conquerer’s new empire, and eventually, trade between England and its empire. Now Southampton is at

the heart of today’s maritime trade. It is the home port to several of the new breed of supersized ocean liners, including the MV Oriana and the Queen Mary 2. For an industry that seemed dead 20 years ago, cruising has made an amazing recovery, and Southampton is also well-placed to take advantage of the new age of globalisation, as the container port gateway to the UK. It’s a lean, fit, modern city, too. It was even named Fittest City in the UK, 2006, by Men’s Fitness magazine because of its young, healthy, gym- loving population. It is also nicknamed “Green City” for its large number of parks and green spaces. Then, of course, there’s the New Forest National Park on the doorstep, the preeminent camping holiday area in the south of England, famous for its wild ponies. The surrounding Hampshire countryside is like a bread basket, the Downs teeming with sheep and cattle, the valleys home to fields of strawberries and moist green watercress farms. The city itself is an easy place to do business. It has a population of 220,000 and access to skilled workers from across Europe (some 20,000 of the population are young go-getters from Poland). With two universities the city is becoming a popular base for IT firms and high-tech start-ups. There is all sorts of help to available to those setting up in business here, including Chambers of Commerce, business centres and groups like Hampshire Fare, dedicated to helping new businesses and promoting all aspects of the local economy. Nearly 400 years after the Pilgrim Fathers left Southampton’s sheltered waters on the Mayflower for their promised land, a new brand of forward-thinking entrepreneurs are blazing their own trails.

Nearly 400 years after the Pilgrim Fathers left Southampton’s sheltered waters on the Mayflower for their promised land, a new brand of forward-thinking entrepreneurs are blazing their own trails

WHERE CHLOE EATS HEALTHILY Zen, a new sushi restaurant. It’s fantastic and a great attribute to Southampton. www.zensouthampton.com

FLY Southampton is one of Flybe’s main hubs and serves destinations all over the UK and Europe

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