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None of the Above!

Greetings all!

I’m using this month’s Rockhoppers not to promote the wonderful South West, nor to update you on the shop or our product lines. No – nothing that upbeat. I’m using it to RANT*. Hope that’s OK? If you’re not up for a RANT today, no worries – come back and read the entry another day… Maybe when you’re feeling a little bit RANTY yourself.

Now, I know banks are an easy target for RANTS from, well, pretty much everyone these days, and far be it from me to jump on an easy bandwagon, but I’ve got my own particular gripe with banks and that is: their approach to businesses and how they treat their business customers. I think my bugbear is best summed up by the following scenario. I’m contemplating changing our business account (for long and boring reasons, but mainly because I’m fed up with paying oodles of fees for, y’know, just using the actual account. Apparently, doing anything other than leaving your cash in the account to snooze for years on end attracts some sort of fee…); anyhoo, I was browsing a few websites, and I came across the website of a large high street lender, let’s call them Cat Best. On Cat Best’s business banking home page there is a drop down menu titled “Choose type of business”, and the options are as follows:

  • Start Up
  • Turnover Up to £2 million
  • Turnover £2 million or over

Now, my message to Cat Best and every other frigging bank in this country is as follows:

Isn’t categorising businesses into EITHER start ups OR turnover up to £2 million OR over a little… well… broad?!?! I appreciate “Up to £2 million” covers a whole host of turnovers – £2000 per year, £20,000 per year or £200,000 per year, but it’s the insinuation that you are either a start up (and are therefore titchy tiny small at the moment but with the right nurturing from a wizzy jolly bank you’ll be well on your way to your first million before you can say “fee free banking”…) or you are already aiming towards that Holy Grail of £2 million. Well done you.

Now, I don’t think I’m giving away too much about our business finances when I say that Rockpool will not be cracking open the champagne to celebrate hitting the £2 million mark any time soon (or, indeed, ever). We are, in the most literal sense, a small business. We’ve grown since we began but we are still small and shall probably remain relatively small for the majority of our business life. That’s not negative or unambitious – it’s simply the truth. Lumping us in with the “approaching-£2-million” brigade is frustrating as we seldom seem to get deals with cater for us, and we suffer being compared to businesses so fundamentally different from ourselves. We deal with local suppliers and sell handmade pieces – nothing we sell is mass produced, so we do not benefit from economies of scale. We are a tiny fish in the very big ocean of retail.

BUT WE LOVE THAT!! We love that we’re personal, individual and unusual – we don’t deal in large numbers or big volumes. We are, in all respects, small, and we celebrate our littlness! It would just be nice if the banks realised that we’re not all start ups or millionnaires – somewhere in the middle are thousands of small independent businesses like us who are pootling along, providing great choice and service for our customers and giving the market a bit of personality.

But unfortunately you never see that in a drop down menu do you?

Anyway, RANT over. As you were.

 

*The word RANT should always be in capitals. It looks too quiet and wimpey in lower case. rant…. meh….

 

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Rockpool Trading goes 3D!

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Woohoo! Check me out at the launch of Rockpool’s flagship shop in The House that Jack Built on The Barbican, Plymouth!

Oh, we didn’t mentioned we’d packed in the day job and taken out a lease on a shop, throwing all the securities of employment to the wind in the pursuit of a long treasured dream…?

I’d better go back a few steps.

So, as some of you might know, I (with the help of Mr RT) ran Rockpool whilst also juggling our full time jobs and the child care of a 2 year old. We weren’t masochists – it was always our intention to nurture our little fledgling business to a stage where we could give up the 9-5 and run RT full time. However, 3 years of toiling online and at craft fairs, and this dream still felt a long way off. Fate clearly got sick of our fannying around, and intervened in the form of my compulsory redundancy notice. Never a nice piece of post to receive but in my case it felt like a weight had been lifted; now, I had a clear cut choice to make: I could look for alternative employment and continue with Rockpool in my spare time, or I could throw caution to the wind and GO FOR IT.

I decided to GO FOR IT.

In a strange twist of fate, one of our preferred locations for a shop, The House that Jack Built in Plymouth’s historic Barbican district, co0incidentally had an available unit – it felt too good any opportunity to pass up, so on mini-RT’s 2nd birthday at the end of January this year, we agreed to be the proud new inhabitants of units 4 & 6 in The House that Jack Built.

Since that time my feet have bared touched the ground: I had to work out my notice with the outgoing employer, contact all the lovely existing RT suppliers and beg them to start producing at the rate of knots, source new suppliers to join our band of merry men (and women), rebrand and redecorate, all in 5 weeks. Needless to say there were many late nights, heated discussions, takeaways, panicky phone calls, spontaneous decisions, more takeaways, tears, tantrums and triumphs. But with the invaluable help of an extended possee of workers we opened our beautiful little home on 7th March 2015, and we couldn’t be happier.

Who knows what the future will bring? For now it just feels pretty darned great to have stopped procrastinating, and started doing. At the risk of sounding like a bad Facebook quote, some chap once said “It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop”. Amen to that.

 

 

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The tale of two cities…

So, I was at a training course today – a local course, for local people, if you will – and the course leader made a comment, when discussing the two largest cities in the South West, that “Plymouth is the poor relation of Exeter”. Now, as some of you will know, the whole Rockpool team is Plymouth born and bred and we’re super proud of our city; however, I’d arrived late to this course and didn’t really know anyone, so I did what most “it isn’t polite to make a fuss” people do: I huffed passive-aggressively and rolled my eyes.

But it’s been bothering me ever since: why on earth is this myth still being peddled? Before I start, I must stress this isn’t a “my city’s better than your city” rant: I really like Exeter and (aside from their football team…) I think the city has bucket-fulls of brilliant things to offer the South West as a whole: the shopping, the uni, the architecture, all a big thumbs up. I don’t really subscribe to this local rivalry thing: I like Exeter. There, I said it.

However, what does irk me ever so slightly is the constant comparison between Exeter and Plymouth. It’s completely baffling, as historically, geographically, demographically, in every way they’re so completely different. And what irks me even more is that Plymouth seems to come off, well, as “the poor relation”. Poor?!? Plymouth is well over twice the size of Exeter, and has the range of shops, restaurants, bars and facilities you’d expect to meet the needs of one of the UK’s top 20 biggest cities. (Admittedly, a Jamie Oliver Italian Restaurant wouldn’t go amiss, but it’s OK, apparently another nearby city is getting one soon…). We have (nearly) 3 universities, the National Marine Aquarium, the largest Naval Base in Western Europe and a jolly fine lighthouse. And whilst it’s not to everyone’s taste, we have the highest number of post-war listed buildings in the UK, outside of London, after the city was largely decimated during the Blitz. It’s a city of spirit, humour and stonking amounts of history. Like proper history: going off to discover new lands-type history.

So, if you’ll indulge me, this is what I wish I’d said to this misguided woman:

“Excuse me Cynthia* – I think you’ll find that’s a load of outdated twaddle, peddled by out of touch people like your good self, who no doubt live in Exeter and want to boost the value of their postcodes. Plymouth is a diverse, interesting, buzzing and beautiful city with more history in 3 cobbled streets on the Barbican than the entirety of some British cities. Now, I can see why you might be brainwashed – it’s the easiest thing in the world to poke fun at Plymouth: it’s working class roots, it’s marmite architecture and frankly, the funny sounding accent, could make it a figure of fun to other, more middle-class cities. But I would strongly suggest you take another look, for these are the things which make Plymouth great, and certainly no one’s poor relation. And if this still hasn’t convinced you: Plymouth produced Tom Daley; I doubt Exeter could boast producing anything as beautiful”.

I wish I said all that. But I didn’t: I sat and inwardly drafted a blog post.

*Names have been changed to protect the ignorant.

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Oh dear oh dear oh dear

What can I say? We’re closing in on three months since the last blog… *hangs head in shame*. There’s no point in messing around with the whys, wherefores and where-the-hell-have-you-beens about why I haven’t kept you up to speed since 8th October – there really is no more impressive excuse than Christmas arrived on our doorstep on 9th October and I’ve only just woken up from the Manic Festive Dream, a little like Dorothy after her adventures in Oz, with only hazy recollections of what the last few weeks have entailed. So, here we go, lets try and summarise some of the highs, lows, lessons, experiences and anecdotes from the last 84 days…

First off, 10 fairs in 2 and a half months is a mammouth undertaking, when you factor 2 jobs and 1 toddler in to the equation as well. There’s no beating around the bush – despite all the fun and frolics (and Quality Street) we had along the way, I was so ridiculously relieved to pack away the last box on 15th December and know that I didn’t have to open it again until the new year. There – I’ve said it. Bad small business owner! However, despite this relief it was also really sad to say goodbye to our gorgeous Christmas products until October 2015 – they’re far to beautiful to sit in a box for the best part of 10 months. Humph.

And whilst I’m prattling on about it – I’ve heard enough Christmas compilation CDs to last me 10 lifetimes and then some. I’m all for creating an atmosphere, but event organisers: spare a thought for your stallholders who are probably, like me, on a massive Christmas fair marathon and therefore have to endure Maria-bloody-Carey and Cliff-blinkin-Richard literally dozens of times. Nevertheless, we are professionals – not a smile faltered, not a swear word was uttered and not a chair was thrown through a window in a Shakin’-Stevens-induced rage. Having said that, indoor fairs, even with their musical challenges, are a breeze compared to outdoor fairs; outdoor fairs are fraught with risk – wind and rain being the first thoughts that spring to mind, but there are less obvious hazards to keep an eye out for as well: dogs peeing against your table leg for example…

Despite all this, Christmas for Rockpool was the best we’ve ever had. Increasing our presence on the craft fair scene, coupled with an unexpected Plymouth Magazine cover story and other press interest has meant we’ve had oodles of lovely, local crafters contact us asking to join our merry band, as well as lots more online orders. Our only problem was selling out of some particularly popular lines, and big apologies to those makers who I had to contact 2 or 3 times to restock during the last few weeks. Next year the matra will definitely be: Christmas comes but once a year, so order early and order big…

In other news, I’ve now officially been served with my notice of redundancy from the day job, so in 2015 we’ll be saying Bye Bye nine to five rat race and Hello unpredictable and exhilarating world of self-employment. Whilst it’s been tempting to adopt the tried, tested and entirely healthy head-buried-in-sand procedure for the last few weeks, as New Year is looming I know I need to come up with a post 31st March 2015 Plan. Seeds have already been sown and research has already been done to ring the changes for Rockpool next year, so hopefully when the spring comes, my little, loved, green shoots of a business will be well on its way to becoming, well, a bit less little and green shooty…

 

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The times they are a-changing…

Greetings from a rainy, windy, grey, but still beautiful, Plymouth. September was, all things considered, a bit of a mixed bag for the RT team, but nevertheless we’re crashing on through life’s little ups and downs with a spring in our step, a song in our hearts and a glass of Shiraz in our hands…

Starting from the top, on a personal note, Mrs RT has been told that she is going to be made redundant after 6 years with her current employer. Which sucks. But every cloud…yada-yada-yada, and this might be the kick up the backside she needs to plough all her efforts into Rockpool full time. Starting a business is super-scary, and we overcame that hurdle 3 years ago when RT first went live. Now we’re fast galloping towards the next hurdle – running the business full time and relying on it for income. Oh ‘eck. Still – as my ol’ Dad likes to say, it’s not a challenge, it’s an opportunity in disguise. And this is one whopping big opportunity.

Anyhoo – onto more positive things. We’ve been going craft fair booking CRAZY this month, and have now secured 9 fairs in November and December. Seriously – if you’re personal friends of ours and you want to see us leading up to Christmas, come to a craft fair. (And bring mince pies). It’s going to be manic, but loads and loads of fun and we can’t wait to get started. After taking RT on the road on a regular basis in 2014, we’re now really looking forward to attending fairs with a). loads of lovely new Christmas stock and b). loads of frantic people who promised themselves they’d start shopping in June but then remembered it was sunny and there was much better stuff to be doing in June, and are now desperate for some beautiful, handmade pressies for their loved ones. Enter Rockpool.

Finally, the repercussions of being awarded the #SBS Winner tag are still rippling; look out for Rockpool in the local press soon! And what’s more, our-mate-Theo has released the date for the 2015 #SBS Winner’s shindig; I feel some major networking coming on. Must remember that networking does not mean propping up the bar and chatting to people as and when they decide to get a drink…

 

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Mr Paphitis – an all round top human being

As avid readers of Rockhoppers will tell you, I’m adept at making excuses as to why I don’t blog every week; but refreshingly, the reason for this post’s tardiness is not that we’ve been swanning off, enjoying all the action the South West has to offer. No! This post is shockingly overdue because Rockpool Trading has had an unexpected, but super appreciated, boost from everybody’s favourite Dragon – Mr Theo Paphitis!

That’s right – he of Dragon’s Den fame. The shortish one with the glasses, who actually talks a lot of sense? Hang on, I’ll dig out a picture…

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There! Recognise him?? Good. Well aside from being the thinking woman’s crumpet, he’s also a pretty decent human being, and a big supporter of small business, running as he does, a support scheme for small enterprises called #SmallBusinessSunday. Every week he picks 6 businesses out of the thousands who tweet him to support and promote that week, and on 18th August, little ol’ Rockpool Trading joined this elite group of fabulousness.

And this is the reason we’ve been busy – along with the support of Theo comes a tidal wave of social media interest, local press interest, new contacts and hell, even some new orders. And whilst we love everything that comes with being an #SBS winner, it does take us to a whole new level of multi-tasking, as we try to fit in a busy small business with jobs and children. But none of this matters – we’re so so excited to get Mr P’s support and join THE BIG BOYS. The word is spreading Rockhopper fans – we’re now a tiny fish in a very large (rock)pool.

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What I was doing when I should have been blogging…

A month. Shocking. But in my defense, I was out revelling in all the joys Devon and Cornwall (and…ahem…Scotland) has to offer. It is the summer after all – and as the Hurricane-formally-known-as-Bertha hoolies it’s way towards the South West, I thought I’d reflect on a fabulous 4 weeks in the Westcountry sunshine…

Week 1 – Watching the inimitable Elbow at the Eden Sessions. An unlikely Mother’s Day pressie from my 1 year old (he knows his Mother well), Mr RT and I were lucky enough to catch the boys from Bury in surely one of the most picturesque venues in the country. If you’ve never seen a gig at Eden, make it a priority – it’s breathtaking (if not a long walk back to your car). And speaking of breathtaking views, the following night we pitched up, with 20,000 others, to MTV Crashes Plymouth. (Yup – Elbow one night, Example the next – who says we’re not eclectic??). The event was certainly loud and proud, and while I’ll save my rant about the lack of bars for another post (and in any event I vented my spleen in a strongly worded complaint to Plymouth City Council to which, incidentally, I’m yet to receive a response), you can’t say this kind of massive event isn’t fantastic for Plymouth, and the wider Westcountry. Plus, on a scorching evening on the Hoe, it’s hard to be grumpy. (Even if you’ve queued for 3 hours for a beer).

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Week 2 – Saw Rockpool attend The Wild Tribe Children’s Festival; the first children’s festival to be held in Plymouth. As new parents we were probably a bit biased, but we thought it was fantastic. Theatre performances, puppets, storytelling, marshmallow toasting, all sorts of messy crafty type things, bands, stalls, amazing food (including Yum and Stuff and Thorough Bread – check them out) and, of course, your local, friendly online retailers. Fab day – can’t wait for it to come back next year.

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Week 3 – Did Accounts. De-fleed the dog. Packed for…

Week 4 – Holidays in Scotland! Too much to cram in – amazing evenings at Hampden watching the athletics at the Commonwealth Games, shows at the Edinburgh Festival suitable for 1 year olds, fabulous fun with much-missed family and more wine than is probably healthy when we all have to get up at 5.30am for the little ones. Even though it’s a long way from the Westcountry, Scotland feels very much like home – can’t wait to be back there again soon.

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So home we are, and back to the lovely day job. More fairs coming up in the next few weeks, and who knows, maybe even the odd new product line. Keep your eyes on the skies Rockhoppers…

 

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When craft fairs go bad…

So – new experience for the RT team at the weekend; trying to battle the wind, rain and, yes, THUNDER to take part in what should have been a homage to the traditional village summer fete. (Come to think of it, maybe it was…?!). Anyhow – if you think I’m exaggerating, take a look at this…

 

 

Yes, the Great British Summer looked down on us in Exeter and thought – “d’you know what this outdoor event needs? A good, torrential downpour…”. Or make that three separate downpours and some rumbles of thunder thrown in for good measure. Naturally, these conditions weren’t exactly conducive to achieving high sales (hell, we were just grateful not to be washed away), but it got me thinking – why on earth can’t you get insurance against this kind of thing?? Losses? The cost of driving from Plymouth to Exeter and back again, parking charges (which, incidentally, are astronomical in Exeter), obviously the fee for the table, and then incidental costs incurred in trying to cheer ourselves up whilst sitting, cold and damp for 6 hours (to wit, two large and rather delicious calzones from the food stand a few metres away, 2 very large coffees and countless cupcakes from the cake stall). It won’t come as a surprise to anyone that, due to the lack of people meandering by our stall (they seem to prefer to dash past us on their way to the main event indoors in the Exeter Pheonix – I can’t imagine why…), we didn’t have the most profitable day.

Still – we take these things in our stride, curse at the skies, take a big breath, start planning for the next one (which, incidentally, is on Sunday 6th July at Mount Edgcumbe) and pray to the weather Gods for clemency. After all – we’re a small business and don’t have “Ridiculous and Quite Frankly Unreasonable Weather” insurance. Please have mercy.

 

 

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El Blog Espanol

Hola Amigos! Como Esta?

Ummm… una cerveza por favour?

OK, embarrassingly that’s all the Spanish I know. In case it wasn’t already clear, the RT team waved goodbye to the rain and gloom of the UK last week and made for the sunshine and sandy beaches of the South of Spain. (Because it obviously poured with rain the whole time we were away DIDN’T IT???).

And whilst I was sipping Sangria by the pool, watching mini-RT paddle round in a rubber ring, it occurred to me that, obvious stuff like language, weather, and the price of beer aside, the South of England and the South of Spain aren’t so different. Beaches? Yep, we’ve got a few of them. Stunning scenery – si, in abundance. Lovely people – definitely. Laid back attitude? Well they have Manana and we have ‘Dreckly – pretty much the same thing when push comes to shove…

And of course, there’s always the beautiful, locally handcrafted items.  Here’s Mrs RT indulging in a little local shopping (and yes, I did check, they were all “Handmade in Spain”).

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Still – you’ll never find us upping sticks and joining the Ex-Pats community in the Costa Del Sol. The weather may be great, the booze may be cheap and the locals may be friendly (and tolerant of our basterdisation of their mother tongue), but we’re with Dorothy on this one – there’s no place like home.

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Oooops – There Goes May

Oh my God I haven’t blogged in nearly a month. That is disgraceful! Rest assured I feel suitably ashamed… And on a completely unrelated note, the RT team are off on hols to Spain soon, so next week’s entry might be affected as well… Normal service will resume shortly, I promise.

Anyway – aside from my poor blogging over the last month, life in Rockpool Trading-land has been pretty swell. The news in brief is as follows…

New lines have been added to the website, the sun has been (mostly) shining (aside from the odd clap of thunder), have attended fairs in Devon & Cornwall and had a lovely time nattering to lovely people, attempted (and failed) to find a dog groomer to sort out our walking bush of a labradoodle, continued the ongoing quest to teach myself to crochet, carried out more research new suppliers who might join our happy RT family, realised mini-RT can now turn the gas hob on, banished mini-RT from the kitchen until he’s 10 and old enough to make Mummy breakfast in bed on her birthday, successfully got tickets for MTV Crashes Plymouth, watched in horror as some Polish lass in the in the Eurovision Song Contest did something unspeakable with a butter urn, got mini-RT his first mini-passport for his upcoming travels, went to the cinema twice in one month and felt momentarily young and extravagant, voted (and then ranted at anyone who would listen about the results), and had a mini-pedicure.

All in all, May has gone off without a hitch.

Finally, had a quick semi-business, semi-pleasure trip to Liskeard last weekend, and Mr RT was highly amused by a sign he saw in the window of the local Boots. Only in Cornwall people, only in Cornwall…

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