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Have a clear purpose and be bold about exporting: Food entrepreneur's top tips for a successful start-up

Published: 09:54 EST, 17 October 2015 | Updated: 15:21 EST, 17 October 2015

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If you have a health food business or you’re working on a start-up which could help ‘wean us off sugar in clever ways’, you’re contributing to what is going to be an ‘enormous, enormous market’, Sir Richard Branson told a room full of food entrepreneurs earlier this month.

He was speaking at the Virgin StartUp 2015 Foodpreneur Festival at The Vinyl Factory venue in Soho, London, where he announced seven of the UK’s ‘hottest foodies’ as winners of a mentoring package and the chance to meet buyers at Target Corporation in the US, which is seeking up to four new products to trial in its American stores.

Virgin StartUp is Branson’s not-for-profit company providing funding and support for entrepreneurs, and the retail category winners of its Foodpreneur Festival competition this year were Cauli Rice, high end soft drinks firm Double Dutch Drinks, Harry Brompton’s London Iced Tea, marshmallow company Mallow and Marsh, and Pip & Nut nut butter firm. Humpit Hummus in Leeds, and CLAW Food, a London seafood stall, were the winners in the street food category.

Sir Richard Branson with entrepreneur Paul Lindley, who founded Ella’s Kitchen baby food company

Liz Truss, the Secretary of State for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs, who also attended, said Britain’s food and drink revolution is powering our ‘thriving £100billion a year food and drink industry’, and added that efforts to remain the most innovative and dynamic food nation in the world include trebling the number of food and farming apprentices by 2020.

Branson told the audience of food start-ups: ‘I think lots of people are working on health foods, and I’ve got to an age now where I want to stay healthy for the next 30 years, so I love people who are trying to come up with tasty things that are not full of sugar.’

‘I think that’s going to be a large part of the future – trying to fill us up with things that are good for us but still taste like chocolate and things. It’s tricky, but it’s worthwhile. It’s going to be an enormous, enormous market.

‘If anyone’s seen the films and studies about sugar, well sugar really is not quite as bad as cigarettes but getting close. We need to wean ourselves off in a clever way,’ he said.

Gem Harris, founder of Cauli Rice, was one of the winners of this year's Foodpreneur Festival

This month UK Trade & Industry revealed a record 4,000 UK food and drink businesses exported almost £1billion of their British produce to shops and restaurants around the world in the past two years.

Targets set in 2013 by the Coalition to directly help 1,000 UK food and drink businesses sell their produce abroad by October 2015, generating £500million for businesses, have been beaten. Four times that number have received UKTI support to win £985 million sales from around the world.

Paul Lindley, founder of Ella’s Kitchen baby food company, which has a 20 per cent share of the UK baby food sector and a global turnover of $100million, gave the budding food entrepreneurs his own advice, and said: ‘I would strongly recommend that you establish what your business is and that you know that your food works with the UK market.

'But as soon as you’ve got a brand or business that works, think about export and growth. Food exports have doubled in the last 10 years, and that’s significantly above any other kind of export.’

He explained that food businesses in Britain have many advantages. Firstly, he said: ‘Food is at the centre of our whole society.’

He explained: ‘Food is absolutely right at the centre of who we are. The food industry itself is such a massive part of our nation. Over £22billion is generated by the food industry in our economy, that’s 16 per cent of the whole of the manufacturing in the UK. We employ over 400,000 people.

'Over 96 per cent of all businesses in the food industry are small businesses. We’ve got the potential, collectively between us, to have an audience of every single person on this island.’

He also said British food start-ups benefit from being ‘a member of a community of 27 nations’, in a time zone where they can work in normal hours and conduct trade with the vast majority of markets, and from speaking English, ‘the international language of business’.

He added: ‘Research is free and flights are cheap. We can understand different markets for much less money than people could in previous times’.

ELLA’S KITCHEN FOUNDER'S TOP TIPS FOR A SUCCESSFUL FOOD START-UP

Tips: Paul Lindley, founder of Paddy's Bathroom and Ella's Kitchen

1. Have a clear purpose from the word go, and then stick to it. Today, the most successful businesses have a strong mission and purpose right at the heart of their business model. Ella’s Kitchen was driven by my mission to improve children’s lives by giving them a healthier relationship with food; that ultimate goal has guided every decision we’ve made from the start.

2. Be bold about exporting – but do your research. It’s better to have double-digit market share in a select number of countries than a low impact in many, so research thoroughly and be disciplined about selecting which markets to enter. Organisations like UKTI are a fantastic source of support for information on anything from distribution options to cultural differences. Try to get an understanding of the whole picture of a country; local economies, social demographics, red tape, VAT laws.

3. Don’t be afraid to be patriotic. The UK is a great place to have a business; the EU has no real barriers to entry, we’re right in the heart of the most traded time zone, and we speak the international language of business. The ‘British brand’ has an excellent reputation abroad, so remember to use it to your advantage when you can.