Running a business from home is becoming an increasingly attractive option as the job market gets even tougher and technology makes it far easier to work remotely.
Today is Home Enterprise Day, part of the second Global Entrepreneurship Week, which celebrates and encourages entrepreneuralism around the world.
More than 60 per cent of businesses in the UK are started from the home, according to estimates, and of those enterpreneurs a number are now running successful global businesses.
Wendy Shand set up Tots to Travel, a family friendly travel company, in April 2006, after a family holiday in France led to her seeing a gap in the market for genuinely child-friendly holiday properties.
She launched the business, which she runs from a converted garage at her home in Nassington, Peterborough, by scouting for suitable properties in France, for example those with stairgates to stop children falling down stairs, as well as appropriate accommodation for children, and then letting them out to holidaymakers.
Wendy, 35, now employs 20 marketing agents around the world, all of whom are mums, who locate suitable child-friendly rental properties in the UK, France, Spain, Portugal and Asia. Having sold more than one million holidays since launching the business, Wendy now plans to expand the company into the Middle East and the U.S. Turnover is expected to reach £500,000 this year.
She says: ‘After going on holiday with my husband and two children a few years ago it was clear that there was a real gap in the market for decent properties that were genuinely suitable for families to rent for a holiday.
‘The reality is that there is a lot of rubbish out there and culturally other nations may not have the same views about what is suitable as we do, which is why our employees are all British, as well as being mothers.’
Wendy typically recruits representatives through networking events or through word of mouth.
She adds: ‘There are many mums out there who have had amazing careers but who may find it harder to get back into the current workplace, either because of a lack of jobs or because they need flexible working hours. We can provide this and our staff are incredibly motivated and interested as a result.’
Wendy has one full-time employee working from the home, and husband Rob, 35, who is in the military, has also become increasingly involved – one of the advantages of running a home business believes Wendy, who previously worked in marketing and P.R and now combines the business with bringing up her three young children.
‘With technology as it is running a home business no longer means being a tiny shoe-string affair. We ensure the office is manned between 9.30 and 5.30 during the day, but the phones are manned until 9pm at night and thanks to the internet the business is actually operating 24 hours a day.’
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