Burlesque and Business

A lot of famous strippers, even Dita von Teese (whom I happen to share a month and day of birth with - obviously best showgirls are libras!), have humble beginnings. Some are actually delighted to talk about them and even create acts around the working class background as did a friend of mine, aka Princess Betty North. Betty, dressed from head to toe in pink lacy and satiny fluffiness explains with heavy northern accent what a bloke might get for getting her a pint (sadly one pink glove off), a burger at a local joint (here the corset comes off but stockings and underwear remain), or a full wine-and-dine experience in the poshest part of Bradford (here she procedes with the sauciest and funniest dance accompanied by nearly full strippage). The beginnings of my company, now with over forty employees and a decent £4m turnover, were also pretty meagre.

I arrived in London in late 2006 to study at University College London as an affiliate student under the Erasmus scholarship and university exchange programme. I was thrilled as I also saw this as an opportunity to reinvent myself in a major way. I had a BA from Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland, a string of successes as a kind of student who is usually the best at everything, and also a few years’ legacy of well hidden depression and eating disorders. The cycle of relatively sophisticated (and not very obvious) self-destruction I had been stuck in proved exhausting and I was ready for a change. It was the perfect time to recreate myself. 

At first I dreamt about a career in the advertising industry but soon enough I ditched those dreams in favour of my fascination with the startup folk. I admired their audacity, the stunning nature of their arrogance expressed in a flamboyant belief that they can actually change something - in the world, in their industry, in a specific niche. I couldn’t believe what these people were made of and I felt pure fascination. All of a sudden I wanted to drink beer and munch on pizza at various meet-ups with them (rule no 1 of early stage founders: Thou shalt not disregard free food and alcohol). I was even willing to pretend I knew what product-market fit meant so I could get into some conversations. And so I did. 

Before I knew it, I was one of them. It had to be. Not so much because of the free pizza, but because of the audacious and fearless spirit that warned my heart. “I want to do something genuinely new in my industry and I know I’ve got statistically maybe a 10% chance I’ll make it past the first year. So what?! Of course I’m in.” I was definitely hooked. My first attempts of creating a company that actually worked commercially were rather pathetic, which tends to be the case with most founders. The business model changed every two weeks, there were grand visions but little follow through. I felt important, I was a cofounder now! And I felt terrible at the same time as I realised most of the meet-up conversations I was previously fascinated by boiled down to a bunch of folks trying to drown their fears and struggles in the company of like minded individuals. While being unable to talk openly about their fears and struggles. “It’s going great, this is the next big thing! I can tell you in more detail if you sign an NDA”. “We have so many new sign-ups, it’s an L shaped curve!”. “Investors are literally biting our hands off, there’s so much interest”. Most of these folks were confused, lost and struggling while trying to make their little ventures work. Those who weren’t struggling, for the most part weren’t there. They were busy doing precisely the things that needed to be done. And I, for one, at least back then, had no idea what these things were. 

At some point my level of frustration with myself, and the venture I was trying to push relying on zero skills and experience and a tonne of determination, reached a sufficient level that a change became necessary. GrantTree was born out of a reluctant partnership with my boyfriend of a year who had just failed with his previous startup, was completely skint and sort of lost his belief in entrepreneurial career. He’d reduced his pay drastically since leaving Accenture to pursue the dreamland of the startup life and was now living in a room so small, it had no space for a desk so he literally worked from bed, or his close friend’s (who was also the MD of the company) guest room transformed into a tiny office.

When the company eventually closed down, the same friend, now based elsewhere, kindly allowed us to live in the apartment on credit, while we were barely making ends meet. In those jolly circumstances, we started GrantTree, advisory company in financial services set out to help innovating organisations secure R&D tax credits and R&D grants, which we do to this very day. It’s just that by now we’ve secured more than £120m worth of equity free funding for our clients. Back when I first got down to selling our services, those were backed up by non existent track record, no testimonials and no known brand. Being the “saleswoman from hell” as a colleague jokingly called me much later, even though the task wasn’t easy, I got on with and started getting interest pretty much right away. And so one evening Daniel and I decided we urgently needed a company name, a website and a bank account.