74. How to grow a business fast and exit successfully | Andrew Hulbert

Summary

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Podcast Summary – James Reed: All About Business

Episode 74: How to Grow a Business Fast and Exit Successfully | Andrew Hulbert
Host: James Reed (Reed Global)
Guest: Andrew Hulbert (Founder, Pareto Facilities Management)
Date: April 13, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode features a candid, insightful conversation between James Reed and Andrew Hulbert, the founder of Pareto Facilities Management. Andrew details his journey from a challenging upbringing on a council estate in Oxford to building, scaling, and successfully exiting a multi-million-pound business by age 37. The discussion is rich in actionable advice on entrepreneurship, business growth, personal branding, and maintaining balance between professional success and personal life.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Humble Beginnings and Family Values

• Andrew grew up in a tight-knit, working-class family on a council estate in Oxford. Family and community values became foundational to his character and business philosophy.
• The "family unit" was more than immediate relatives—up to 75 people lived nearby, creating a supportive network (03:00–04:00).
• His grandparents were local leaders, deeply involved in community activities, inspiring Andrew’s own commitment to community and integrity in his later business (04:07–05:03).

“You can have all the money in the world… actually they weren't rich people, but they were brilliant for the community. They were genuine leaders… that’s really where I resonate and it’s where I get my community spirit from.” (04:07–05:03, Andrew)

2. Teen Challenges, Turning Points & Early Entrepreneurship

• Andrew had a rebellious adolescence, briefly involved in petty crime (notably, bike theft from Oxford Brookes students) but narrowly avoided getting a criminal record (05:30–07:04).
• Survived a violent assault at age 15, which became a catalyst for change—he decided not to take revenge, avoided ongoing trouble, and shifted focus when entering sixth form (07:04–10:21).

“A knife is more likely to be used back on yourself… If you can somehow get over that red mist and that red anger… you just need to take yourself out of the situation.” (08:44–09:05, Andrew)

3. Education, Serendipity, and the Value of Work Experience

• With no family tradition of university attendance, Andrew’s path to higher education required family sacrifices.
• Met his future wife on his very first day at university, a "sliding doors" moment that shaped his future (11:49–11:59).
• Work ethic and adaptability built through “legit” jobs—early mornings, temping via Reed, even a single day as a binman (16:18–18:06).

“Stick yourself in the middle of that situation and see how you get on. Some people sink, some people swim.” (18:44–19:09, Andrew)

4. Entering the Workplace & Building a Business

• After a business degree, Andrew joined a £6m property services company, quickly becoming Operations Director at 24, managing a large team (19:19–21:39).
• Disliked big company culture post-acquisition and decided to take the leap at age 27, starting Pareto FM from scratch in his bedroom (21:39–22:01).

5. Differentiating in a Crowded Market

• Strategy: Put people first (timely pay, good equipment, flexible processes), radically adapt to client needs, and embed genuine Environment, Social, Governance (ESG) principles.
• Early growth relied on leveraging an existing personal brand—networking, awards, visibility (24:16–25:21).

“I wanted to start this modern version of what a facilities management and property business could be… Put people right back at the heart again… Make your processes completely flexible… And do brilliant sustainability initiatives…” (22:04–23:30, Andrew)

• Targeted big-name clients from the start (Bulgari Hotel, Yahoo, Candy Crush, Twitter, London Zoo), emphasizing adaptability and direct, personal service (23:31–27:18).

6. Achieving Exponential Growth

• Winning the London & Whipsnade Zoo contract led to 300% annual growth and established market credibility (28:29–30:08).
• Insights on the FM sector: success driven by winning and retaining long-term, high-value contracts (5–7 years), flexible customer-centric service, and continuous adaptability (31:05–33:03).

“Every quarter for 10 years straight, Pareto grew. Some years we grew 300%... Trying to keep hold of that growth was really quite difficult.” (31:54–32:08, Andrew)

7. Entrepreneurial Burnout, Exit Strategy, and Life After the Sale

• Discussed the toll of relentless entrepreneurship: 18-hour days, family strain, health impacts (35:03–36:13).
• Pre-planned his exit with his wife—created and executed a three-year strategy to sell.
• Hired a strong successor team; crucial advice about leadership transition and not needing to be the replacement’s best friend (37:08–37:59).
• Successfully exited the business at 37, a process he describes as grueling (“856 due diligence questions in just over three weeks”) but ultimately rewarding (38:00–38:58).

8. Post-Exit Fulfilment and New Challenges

• Focused on fatherhood and family: daily school runs, making lunches, active parenting (39:06–40:05).
• Dabbled in luxury (“bright yellow McLaren”) but discovered true satisfaction in a simple, family-oriented life (40:31–41:52).
• Ongoing projects: investing in children’s homes, buying/operating a farm, environmental conservation (forest planting, nature reserve acquisition) (45:07–46:24).

9. Personal Growth, Advice, and Philosophy

• Underwent a drastic health transformation—lost nine stone in seven months through extreme discipline and self-challenge (42:43–45:05).
• Strong believer in building a personal brand and learning on someone else’s payroll before going solo (43:43–45:05).

“I am nothing special. I didn’t come from anything special… With the right mindset, I believe people can do the same thing… You have to be ready to go all in at some times to actually sacrifice other things to be a success.” (44:51–45:05, Andrew)

• Advocates for giving back—one of the world’s most frequent blood donors, with over 1,000 lives saved (58:01–59:08).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Sales Ingenuity:
  "Entrepreneurs, if you’re small… Work out what they’re not good at. My competitors had a carbon footprint over a million tons… Ours was 169 tons. I used to take 5,000 jelly beans into a sales pitch... ours is one third of a jelly bean compared to 5,000."
  (46:34–47:45, Andrew)

• On Advice for Entrepreneurs:
  "It’s not what you do nine to five, it’s what you do five to nine... Build on the side... When you start on day one, you’re not at zero. You may already be at level two out of ten at that stage."
  (55:10–56:58, Andrew)

• On Work-Life Balance:
  "There is nothing more precious than being with your kids and not having an alarm clock and having a cuddle and them holding your hand as you go into school… you forget about the money, forget about the success, forget about the bright yellow sports cars. Nothing matters. Being in that moment is what matters."
  (57:23–57:50, Andrew)

• On Personal Branding:
  "Go to the office five days a week because your presenteeism activities will get you much further than the other people who are not there three days a week... Early life is about building your own personal brand and business…"
  (13:47–14:31, Andrew)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:00–05:03 — Early family life, council estate upbringing, influences
• 05:23–10:21 — Teen challenges, near-misses, and early lessons
• 11:00–12:42 — University transition, meeting his wife, value of serendipity
• 16:15–19:09 — Early jobs, grit, lessons from “unskilled” work
• 19:17–25:21 — Starting Pareto FM, industry insights, early business philosophy
• 28:29–31:54 — Zoo contract, scaling rapidly, the role of long-term contracts
• 35:03–38:00 — Burnout, family, exit planning
• 46:24–49:01 — Sustainability, social enterprise, memorable sales strategies
• 49:44–53:02 — Changing workplaces, future of the office, generational shifts
• 55:10–56:58 — Practical advice for would-be entrepreneurs
• 57:23–59:08 — Personal reflections, blood donation, giving back

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Closing Advice & Vision

• On Entrepreneurship:
  Don’t be afraid to build your brand or business “on the side”—learn, adapt, and test before making the leap (55:10–56:58).
  “Overwhelmingly, go for it. If you think you’ve been inspired by what I’ve said today… You just have to work incredibly hard and be focused on what you’re doing.” (57:03–57:04, Andrew)

• On Fulfilment:
  Success is about more than money—family, community, and integrity are ultimate measures of a life well-lived (57:23–57:50).

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For Listeners

This episode serves as both a masterclass on growing and selling a business and a reminder that success, when achieved at a young age, brings new opportunities for purpose, giving back, and redefining personal and professional legacy.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to All About Business with me, James Reed, the podcast that covers everything about business management and leadership. Every episode I sit down with different guests of bootstrapped companies, masterminded investment models, built a business empire. They're leaders in their field and they're here to give you top insights and actionable advice so that you can apply their ideas to your own career or business venture. What happens after you build and sell a company for 100 million and then step away from the business world before the age of 40? Today on all About Business, I'm joined by Andrew Hulbert, founder of Pareto Facilities Management, a company he built from scratch into a 50 million pound workplace services business employing more than 500 people. In this episode we discuss building a business from humble beginnings, the realities of entrepreneurship, and what happens when success arrives earlier than expected. Well, today on All About Business, I'm really delighted to welcome Andrew Hulbert. Andrew is an entrepreneur and is now chair of the Institute of Workplace and Facilities Management, having built and sold a facilities management company called Pareto fm, which I believe you started from your bedroom at the age of 27 and exited for the princely sum of $100 million.

[B]

That's. That's right.

[A]

Is it, Andrew? Well, that seems like a good place.

[B]

You are well researched.

[A]

That's great. Thank you. That's my job. That's my job. But I, I think let's begin with your early life because I think you, you, you grew up on a council estate in Oxford.

[B]

Yes. So my family. Family units from the council estate. Yeah, I think I mentioned earlier, my grandmother moved there in 1953 in a car. Grandfather. And they built the family unit up from there. But. So they started in the caravan, didn't even have a house initially, but they ran the community center and they. It was my grandmother's funeral just a couple of weeks ago, which was tremendously sad. But she was 93, so she had a fantastic.

[A]

So what was her name?

[B]

Gene. Bradley. Bradley.

[A]

So they went to Oxford.

[B]

Yeah, they, they went to Oxford. And do you know what was really magical about that? That funeral. There was also a children's home on the estate at the same time. And my nanogram, they just opened their house to that children's home. They could come and eat in there whenever they wanted to. Food's a big part of my family, which I'm sure we'll explore today. And there were three kids from the children's home at the funeral who are now in their 60s and they were still referring to my nanjin as mum and dad. And because that was like part of the ones that brought them up. And I think children's homes back in the 50s and 60s probably weren't quite as progressive as they are today.

[A]

When you said. You said family unit, I feel like that's an interesting way of describing a family. It felt, in my imagination, is a sort of compound.

[B]

Well, I wouldn't say compound, is it?

[A]

I would say describe this, because obviously it was obviously a central place for people to come together.

[B]

It was. I would sort of describe it as a Mafia type group. Really? Well, that's what.

[A]

I didn't want to say that. How does that work? Well, what was it? What was happening?

[B]

What I mean by family unit is, in my immediate family, there are around 75 people across.

[A]

75.

[B]

Correct.

[A]

Which I knew I was on to something, so.

[B]

Yes, go on. Well, it makes Christmas Day a complete nightmare because 75.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

No one has a living room big enough to do it. In my family, everyone lives close by, so everyone's within, say, 10 minutes drive of each other. And when I was 11 and smoking for the first time, even before mobile phones and everything, my mum knew about it before I'd even got home because someone had seen me, who'd spoken to someone, who told her before I got back, and I got a clip around the ear with my Marlborough Gold in my. In my pocket at the age of 11. But, yeah, no, what I mean by family unit is a really close group of family members that all looked out for each other and every Sunday we would get together and eat together. Not all 75, but a big group. And. Yeah, so that's really what family unit means, and community and food and being together. That is my background and that's what I love and I'm so grateful for it. But, yeah, it all started in that caravan on the Northway Council estate in the 50s.

[A]

Right. And so there must have been a lot of people at the funeral.

[B]

Yeah, the funeral. My grandfather's funeral in particular. It was in the crematorium in Oxford. They were queuing out the door. There was easily 200 people there. It was absolutely huge. My grandmother lived for another 10 years after he passed, so by the time she had passed away, a lot of her friends had died by that stage because she outlived them. But I would never forget my grandfather's funeral. And you can have all the money that you want in the world and you can do all those things. But actually they weren't rich people, but they were brilliant for the community. They were genuine leaders, genuinely helpful. And when they were running the community center, they would raise money to buy bikes for the kids and tracksuits and all those things. In a time when you didn't have the Internet and go fund me and all that, this is when they had to do the hard work. So I really, that part of my family unit, that's really where I resonate and it's where I get my community spirit from and ultimately where I try to place my entrepreneurship and subsequent to that, my social activities, because that's really important.

[A]

So you were inspired by your example

[B]

and I really didn't have much choice because it was what we lived every day and yeah, hugely special and entrepreneurs, we come from all different backgrounds and places and everything, but helping people and being a good person and having integrity and always being available to support, that's. That's the core values for me.

[A]

But you had a pretty sort of edgy teenage life, didn't you, in Oxford, this council? What happened? Yeah, well, I know you've got some stories to tell.

[B]

I mean there's plenty of stories that we haven't got long enough. Look, I think before the age of 16, I sort of started hanging around with the wrong crowd really. Now look, I'm 39 now, but when I was 12 I could walk into a shop and buy alcohol and cigarettes, which as a 12, I mean, it's inconceivable now that that would be possible, but I did. And of course when you start hanging around with that sort of group of people and you have the council estate mentality and we were hanging around with other council estate kids as well, you know, having sex early and getting in trouble early and all that sort of stuff. My mum and dad were really worried when I was about 14 that I was going to get someone pregnant. That was the main challenge. And now of course that wasn't the vision for myself but you know, you're a 14 year old boy and exploring everything. So yeah, I got into scrapes. I was a bike thief is one of the ways that I used to make some money. I was very good at stealing bikes.

[A]

Not from those Oxford students.

[B]

From those Oxford students. I mean a real. I always laugh about this. I probably shouldn't always tell the story, but I lecture at Oxford Brookes University, part of their real estate course and, and Brooks is where I used to get the bikes from.

[A]

It's not far from where you live?

[B]

No, no, in Headington. So just down from the old.

[A]

That was your first business?

[B]

It was. And I always laugh whenever I address the students for the first time. And say, don't worry, your bikes are safe. I steal tea bags generally now from corporate events rather than anything else. So, yeah, no, I did a little bit of that and I was just getting in trouble. I used to start fires and bins and all that sort of thing. Just stupid stuff. Yeah, just for fun. Cause we were bored and we didn't have a youth club or anything like that, so.

[A]

Did you end up with a record?

[B]

No, no, no, never got a record. I mean, got pulled over by the police many times for not having lights on my bike. That was mainly the worst thing. But you're quite clever about how you do some of these things. It culminated one day I was hanging around with the wrong people and I was in south park in Oxford. And when I was about 15 and I did get assaulted and I did nearly get murdered, three guys beat me up in the park. They had a T bar scooter handle of those little micro scooters. Two of them held me back, one of them smacked me around the head with the T bar scooter handle about 10 o' clock at night. And I can will never forget this vision of this bar coming towards my head and I. I pulled over to the side and it caught my ear and tore my ear off. And of course, in the family unit, in the community spirit, I didn't call an ambulance, I called my dad.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Dad rushed down, picked me up, all these tea towels, pushed my ear back on the side.

[A]

I can see it's still there. So the ear?

[B]

Just about, yeah. And then we went up to the John Radcliffe and they sewed it back on for me. But I was very angry after that and started carrying a knife and I found the guy that had beaten me up and nearly went back and killed him, but I decided not to and that that was the right choice at that stage, but I had the chance.

[A]

And so this was like sort of gang warfare then?

[B]

Well, to some degree, in a three, in a three versus one situation. But yeah, look, youth is. Youth is dangerous when they're bored. And also because I was 6 foot 3 when I was 15, I was a big guy. So sometimes the real target, yeah, the young, angry, small guys, you know, they want someone to go and beat up. And I wasn't trying to cause any fuss on that day. So, yes, luckily I had an opportunity to get my own back, if you like. And I had had a couple of knives that I carried at that stage and I didn't take that chance.

[A]

What would you say to people now who young, because obviously carrying Knives is a huge problem.

[B]

Huge, yeah. What would I say to people now? I mean, I know it seems like the right thing to do for some people that are very young and angry and trying to protect them, but a knife is more likely to be used back on yourself rather than you using it onto somebody else. And if you can somehow get over that red mist and that red anger. Not everyone is against you, not everyone's trying to get you. And I think when you're a young man and trying to work it out, sometimes that can feel like what's happening and you just need to take yourself out of the situation as much as possible. What used to happen to me, whenever I went into a shop, I would always be followed by the security guards. Now, I didn't steal from shops, I was just doing bikes in Brooks instead, but actually going into the shops I used to hate. It used to really make me angry about what was going on because I was being targeted and I dressed like maybe I was going to, but. But that was it. But look, what happened for me was I got into sixth form and actually all my friends, almost exclusively. Where did you go to? Cherwell School in Oxford. Just normal school. But it just so happened to be that I got in. My GCSE grades were reasonable. I didn't try very hard, but I got in. And all that life that I just described got left behind. And now I was at sixth form with all my white middle classmates who were all going to go to university and they had good jobs and good relationships with their family and their dad didn't abuse them and all that sort of stuff, you know, which was the relationships I'd had before. So I think for me, that was the catalyst for change. Very luckily, at 16, I got in with the right crowd. If I hadn't have done, I would have had a baby when I was young. I would have gone down a certain route. I like to think as an entrepreneur, I still would have made it somehow, but it would have been very difficult and very different.

[A]

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[B]

Yes. And I ended up going to university. Yeah. And actually, my parents are proper hard working, working class, never been to university. They thought university was for rich people and clever people. We were neither of those things. And I'd been messing about for 18 years. So where I had some really difficult conversations with my mum and dad. When I wanted to go, my mum and dad had to sell some bonds and shares and things that they had within Sainsbury, where my mum worked, so they could afford for me to go. So when I got there at the age of 19, on the very first day, my mum and dad had always sacrificed for us because my dad was working hard in the factory and my mum working three jobs. But when I got to university, I felt very lucky to be there. And as the kicker, literally, as I moved into the halls of residence on day one, I held the door open for this beautiful blonde woman who turned out to be my wife. And we were together for 20 years since then.

[A]

So serendipity.

[B]

Oh, and if you want. If you want an extra, you want an extra kicker. She was also born the day before I was.

[A]

All right.

[B]

And so if you believe in fate, there's your little story on the fate side of things.

[A]

That's amazing. That's right. So. So what did you study?

[B]

I studied business and I got into University of Essex, where I went by the skin of my teeth. I got the exact number of points, only because I'd been to Glastonbury and I'd watched Oasis play and I was stood in, 100,000 people, crowded, drinking beer and smoking weed and singing Champagne Supernova and all that came back, did the exam for general studies, which you didn't have to do any classes for, and it said, describe a time that you'd been emotional. And I wrote this essay about being emotional at Glastonbury and I got 100%. And luckily for me, Essex included that general studies as a full A level and it counted towards my degree and I got in by the exact number of points.

[A]

So you owe Oasis hugely.

[B]

And I went to Heaton park twice to see them, to try and thank them directly, but couldn't get close enough to the front. But that was a real moment. And actually, do you know why that was special? Because I'd been earning money since the age of 12. I'd been working in the corner shop, stuffing papers, getting up at 4am on Saturday.

[A]

So you've done legit work as well?

[B]

I've done some real work, yeah. Rather than just stealing bikes and. Yeah. So I ended up. I had Money in terms of like relatively small amounts. But it's the first time going to Glastonbury. I spent that money on something I was just saving. I didn't know what I was saving it for and. But that was one of the first times I spent is £149 or whatever for the ticket. But that was big for me at the time.

[A]

Money now.

[B]

It is. It is. Well, yeah, I think it's 400 now for a ticket. But yeah, my mum really encouraged me to go and yeah, it's the best thing I ever did and without it I wouldn't have gone on this journey. There's many sliding doors moments in early life.

[A]

It is interesting how some moments that maybe don't seem that significant at the time.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

When you look back, become, you know, the pivotal.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And how it's so important to get out there.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Do things, meet people, because you never know when those moments will be.

[B]

But. But isn't that still good advice today? Get out there and be around people. In this lecture I did at Brookes, they're all say, 21, about to go into the world of work. I was saying, how many days do you want to be in the office? To this group, there's about 50 of them. 2. I was like, well, my advice to any entrepreneurs in here is go to the office five days a week because your presenteeism activities will get you much further than the other people who are not there three days a week. And I think early life is about building your own personal brand and business and understanding how business works to get the skills you need to go and start something yourself in the future. The concept of leaving university, starting a business and being a huge success, there are people that do it, but I think we all need to learn from businesses first before we go and build something else.

[A]

I really agree. I mean, a friend of mine's son recently got a job and he was told by the employees, you only have to come in two days a week.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

My friend said to me, what do you think about that? And I said, tell him to go in every day.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Which he did. And he's been promoted three or four times out of pay rise.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And is doing really well. And I think that's exactly because of the advice you just gave.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

The people saw he was committed.

[B]

Yes. He cared. Yes.

[A]

I mean, it's that basic.

[B]

But this is. I mean, it's a tale as old as time. We know academically that this has been the right thing to do since the 80s. I remember in my Course, I studied Japanese culture and in Japanese business culture in the 90s, you'd take an extra jacket and leave it on your chair to make sure that people knew you were there. And if you fell asleep at your desk, it was seen as a great sign that you were working really hard.

[A]

Yeah, that might be overdoing.

[B]

It depends what time you wake up. But even like, go back to Xerox. Xerox knew in the 80s that the engineers coming back from fixing printers at the water cooler and chatting about their knowledge at the water cooler, that tacit knowledge exchange, that was the most precious knowledge they could share. And there's no way Xerox could even make that happen. It was just the fact that they happened to be at the water cooler or the coffee machine. And that was so bent. That was so beneficial.

[A]

So learning from each other.

[B]

Absolutely. But that is still key now, and even more so. And there's a big piece of management theory at the moment that the Gen Zs that don't want to go into the office when the alphas come in, who are not affected by Covid, this is the next generation, this is the next gen. Now, when they come in, they might go back four or five days a week and they might out,

[A]

but I think they are. I see that already. I have a different view.

[B]

Really important. And actually there's only so much entitlement you can have.

[A]

Yeah, I. I think that's interesting. So I understand, you know, while you're a student, you did a bit of work for Reed.

[B]

We did indeed. And this is how we.

[A]

Temporary work.

[B]

This is. Well, very, very temporary. This is how we came to meet at the end of my first year of university. I put on a bit of weight. I'd had a very enjoyable time in the first year, drinking a bit too much. And I went to Reid Agency and I was like, I want to be a dustbin man. And so I thought, great. Now, look at university, genuinely. I was waking up at 5.30pm and I would watch Neighbours at 5.30pm whilst eating my breakfast. For anyone who doesn't know Neighbours, it used to be on twice a day, 2:00pm and 5:00pm, and I went.

[A]

So you were doing a sort of nocturnal course?

[B]

Well, I was. And I wasn't going to my lectures either, which wasn't particularly good. But back in the day, you could buy the cassette of your lecture. And I had a Mini, I had a Metro and I used to listen to the cassette in the Metro, writing my notes while I was eating my cereal and things. I wasn't particularly good in that first year of university. So, yes, I went to read and they got me on the dustbin lorries and I. And I went out. Now, what you should understand is dustbin lorries go out very early. So I had a 3:30am alarm clock on that first day. It's a lovely sunny day and I went over to Didcot. It was where I did it. And I went out with the team. All five of us on there were temps, so they're all through Reed. And we were just trying to work out what we needed to do. We had a route and we had a plan and the driver, he was really keen because on those jobs you got paid the same regardless of what time you finished, so he wanted to do it quick. And we were all running around and sweating and everything for him. And I probably hadn't showered either because it was so early in the morning. So, yeah, we went round. It was brilliant camaraderie. And on the way back, he stopped off and he bought us a pack of Fosters and we all had a beer apart from him on the way back to the depot. And I got back and I got home at maybe 11:30am and I just went back to sleep. And then the next morning when that alarm went off again, I was like, no, this. This isn't for me.

[A]

So you worked for Reed for one day. That's pathetic.

[B]

I did. I. I actually. I did actually also work for Reed separately, because I did, over one of the summers, I worked for Barclays and Barclays use Reed as a. Yeah, they

[A]

were a big client.

[B]

Yes, as an agency, so I was also through them doing some stuff for them in Corn Market street in Oxford. But, yeah, the. The dustbin lorry was a great experience because the characters on there were brilliant. And I. I remember just getting in the bus to go over to the depot and the guy was like, oh, man, should have seen the color of my excrement this morning. I had four Guinnesses last night.

[A]

Oh, no, we don't need to. We don't need to hear that on

[B]

the podcast,

[A]

but these are formative experiences for young people to go and do the. Yeah. Jobs.

[B]

Yeah. And it's hugely formative and actually, I. I wouldn't change it. And. And I don't care. Yeah. I don't care what background you're from. You're from. Stick yourself in the middle of that situation and see how you get on. Some people think, some people swim and I was just too lazy ultimately, physically at that stage. And I. I was so bad with my sleeping pattern, that it was just never going to work for me.

[A]

But as your life progressed, you became quite dynamic, as it turned out.

[B]

Well, yes.

[A]

So you started a business from your bedroom, is that right?

[B]

That's correct. So I.

[A]

Tell us that story.

[B]

Yeah. So I went to university, I studied business and I finished my degree and I got linked up with a property services business, a £6 million one, and I went and joined them for about six years and I.

[A]

So what sort of work were they doing?

[B]

So imagine a nice commercial office in London, nice tall building. We looked after all of the maintenance, the statutory compliance, the leases, everything that it took to deliver statutory services to buildings. And that's what facilities management is from our perspective. I did that.

[A]

So what, just so people understand, what sort of statutory things are we talking about?

[B]

Water management. So literally taking the tap temperatures, checking for Legionella, doing the fire alarm testing, checking the emergency.

[A]

So making sure it's all compliant and safe for the people who work there or use it.

[B]

Exactly. And mainly for insurance purposes because fires do happen and when fires happen and you get investigated from an insurance perspective, you can evidence that you had control of the building. And so that's what facilities management is principally looking after the. The assets and what we know in most businesses, people costs is usually the first cost and property cost is usually the second. So managing property cost effectively is really important. But you've also got how sustainable is the building and what are the energy and utility management pieces, all the changes in compliance and law, which is significant. So yeah, we delivered all of those services on a self delivery model and actually used agencies.

[A]

This was the company you were working.

[B]

That's who I worked for to start with.

[A]

And used agencies to supply staff.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

Because we work with facilities.

[B]

Yes, I would have thought so. Because we employ 1.2 million people in this sector in the UK. It's worth over 100 billion in GDP and so we know it's a critically important one. And Interestingly, there are 125,000 service providers in this sector, according to the Office of National statistics. So starting one was an interesting one because there was 125,000 other people doing what you were doing. I did four years with Rollright and I was an ops director when I was 24. I had a team of 250 people under me at that stage. I was working hard and then we got bought out by a big business and I did two years for that big business. Didn't like the big business mentality. It wasn't for me. I've Gone from being the king of this very small castle to being nobody in the big business. So when I was 27, it's literally true, I. I went home to my wife one day and I said, I'm gonna leave, I'm gonna start my own business. She wasn't entirely on board with the idea to leave a well paid job. We just got a mortgage, we didn't have kids yet at that stage.

[A]

Is she working as well?

[B]

She was working as well, yeah. We were sort of starting to plan the rest of our life really at that stage. And yeah, no, I literally just gave my three months notice and I started Pareto from my bedroom in August 2014. And when I say I started with nothing, it was literally me and a laptop. So I didn't have partners, didn't have processes, didn't have any funding, any investment. It was just me and an idea.

[A]

So what was your idea? How did you do that?

[B]

The concept was that the bigger businesses in our sector had completely lost touch with the client. And actually they were so big that they were too rigid and they didn't treat staff very well and they didn't care about things like sustainability and people and social. And I wanted to start this modern version of what a facilities management and property business could be. And I was 27, so all of my ideas were pretty sort of new and different. So there were really three concepts. Put people right back at the heart again because we just lost touch with the staff and I mean, pay them on time, pay their expenses on time, give them a decent allowance for their boots, give them the tools that they need. They sound really basic. But that wasn't practice. Common practice in the sector. Make your processes completely flexible. So a lot of these big companies, they had really rigid IT processes that if the customer wanted to work with you, the customer had to change their processor to fit yours. I was like, no, no, no, let's turn it around. Let's have really flexible cloud based processes so that we can do it the way the customer wants to do it. And then the final one is what I would call esg. So environmental, social and governance, which really means doing brilliant sustainability initiatives that are very real. So we were carbon neutral on scope one and two, for example. And we'll be net zero by 2027, still going today. But also to have a brilliant social heart. So to be a good business, to help people out, to do lots of initiatives around charity and making our own honey and all that sort of stuff. We had Pareto honey made in Market harbor as well, which I know is a passion of yours.

[A]

Yeah, no, I think that's very good.

[B]

Yeah. So in the end, that's what we started with. But what made us special was we went for the big brands right from the very beginning. I was trying to be a 20 million pound business out of my bedroom from day one. So the first four or five customers, Bulgari Hotel, which is obviously amazing. Jewelry brand, Yahoo, Candy Crush, Twitter, London Zoo.

[A]

So. But you obviously went out and won them as customers, Correct?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So you went and sit to see them presented to them and.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

You're obviously good at that.

[B]

I think so. I hope so.

[A]

We must have been.

[B]

I went on, what was your pitch?

[A]

I mean. So, okay, talk us through Bulgari Hotel. This is in Knightsbridge.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

It's a glittering sort of place. Six star, they say marketing. So this is an amazing hotel. So why did they pick you at 27 out of a bedroom in Oxford?

[B]

Yes, good question. Now look, for the six years prior to starting the business, I'd been networking my ass off. I'd been writing articles, I've been winning awards, I've been doing my LinkedIn. I created a brand for Andrew as myself. So when I started on day one, it wasn't like I come out of nowhere and I just entered the sector and no one knew who I was. They knew who I was because I was good and what I'd been delivering previously. So I knew Bulgari Hotel from the networking and from being around. And I called Jeff. Jeff is the guy who gave me my first opportunity. And Jeff was a bit of a maverick, which in entrepreneurship you need mavericks sometimes to say yes. And it was an engineering contract, a couple of hundred thousand a year. And I called him up and I said, look, Jeff, I've started this business, I'd be really interested in helping you out. I knew Jeff was getting frustrated with the big business that was serving him in that organization. And I was just right place, right time. And the reason I targeted Jeff, he had two kids that were in their 30s that also ran their own businesses. So I was like, look Jeff, if I. Yeah, I know you've got kids similar age to me. I know that you love entrepreneurship and I know that I can deliver services to you in this space.

[A]

Oh, so find an entrepreneur friendly client.

[B]

It was.

[A]

And that's a good idea.

[B]

Yeah. And actually look, that's good networking because the fact I even knew he had kids and what they.

[A]

Yeah, he's going to be sympathetic to you.

[B]

That's the idea. And you also need Someone who's a little bit unhinged, that's going to say, yeah, yes, Your first. Yes is the hardest one because you've got nothing to start.

[A]

Exactly. That's what I'm thinking.

[B]

Yeah. And you just have to convince them. But also, look, I'm a good salesperson. I genuinely went on to sell quarter of a billion pounds of services personally over the next nine years.

[A]

So you were really leading from the front.

[B]

Absolutely. All the way through too much. So I was all in as an entrepreneur. But as soon as you get your first one, and when it happens to be Bulgari hotel, which is 15,000 a night to stay in the suite, and they claim to be one of the most expensive hotels in London, it was a brilliant name to sell from. And then we started to gain a bit of attention.

[A]

So what was the engineering you were doing for them?

[B]

So that was maintenance of all of the, say, heating and air conditioning.

[A]

So you want that to work when you've got £16,000.

[B]

And one of the challenges in that location is the quality of the guests is very high. Perhaps the most famous people in the world and their expectations are very high.

[A]

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking.

[B]

So temperature control is an important one.

[A]

Has to be precise.

[B]

It does. And, you know, especially when you have, like, people from Saudi and Middle east who are coming there and they want it to be very cold. And then there were certain people that were there that wanted it to be very warm and it was all about changing yourself. But.

[A]

So you had to provide the facilities management that would make Absolutely. Deliver.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Deliverable to your client.

[B]

Correct. And it wasn't just the heating and cooling, it was things like the swimming pool. So obviously, when you have public swimming pools, there's lots of risk around Legionella and illness and those things that you have to demonstrate. And then even down to things like the electrical system that's running the building. Electrical systems in London, we have spikes quite a lot. So making sure that if we have a spike or the power goes off for like seven seconds or so, that the building still functions. And because the expectations are very high. But we were good and we were on it and what the one way I can.

[A]

So you need a good network of engineers.

[B]

Hugely. So, yeah.

[A]

Who you have in your.

[B]

Yes, your. Your network.

[A]

I'm thinking of your family unit.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Lessons of that sort of connected. Connected group. It's almost recreating that.

[B]

You are so right. That the strength of an organization. Yes, it was me and yes, it was the engineers that we hired directly into those teams. But it was the specialist service providers outside of this that if I called them at 11 o' clock on Friday night because there was a problem, then they could come. And of course the thing with property services is, especially in a hotel or in a zoo, it's not as if that 5 o' clock everything gets turned off and everyone's all okay. That's a 24, 7 business. And expectations even at 3 in the morning are still very, very high. And if you have water coming through the ceiling at three in the morning, which happens invariably in property, you want to make sure you're going to sort it out. So it was that personal assurance like early on which I was able to give and also they, they knew that I would just give my all and it would happen, it would work and I was able to prove myself from there. So yeah, that's, that's how it started. And then we, we started just to build out from there. So the likes of Yahoo and Candy Crush and London Zoo and things.

[A]

You said the zoo. So you looked after the zoo.

[B]

Still do today. Yeah. Been a ten year contract and so.

[A]

So what has been the most challenging thing that's happened down at the Zooms?

[B]

I can't say some of the things on camera. No. London Zoo and Whipsnade Zoo.

[A]

So you're not responsible for escaped animals?

[B]

There are some stories around those that some made the press. The working in 700 acres with 20,000 animals and over 250 buildings is a phenomenal undertaking for a small business to take on. So that's the, that's the, that's the

[A]

scale footprint of London.

[B]

London and Whipsnade do. Yeah, the two whips. Yeah, whips made over in, in Woburn and we, we built systems for them, we built their compliance, we built their structure and we've been there for 10 years and it's been through competitive retender and it's a really successful customer. Animals are a completely different thing because of course you have something called a category one animal which is something that can kill you. Now of course a spider, a snake or gorilla or an antelope can kill you for one reason or another. So the health and safety protocols and the security there was really important. And London Zoo, they love animals.

[A]

I hope so.

[B]

Yeah, but that, but that is what they do and like that is the most important thing. Human safety, animal safety. And they would never want to get that wrong. And that was so important there. So again, Bulgari may seem nice and shiny and there's lots of Rich people there. But in the zoo, if you got it wrong, animals could be harmed and you didn't want to do that because they were a zoological service, a beautiful client, amazing relationship and something that really helped propel us at the start because when Pareto was about 1.5 million turnover, we brought them on as a customer and it was a couple of million pound a year contract and we grew 300% in one year off the back of that contract.

[A]

So you have a wide variety of clients.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And that's how you scale the business.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So what was the moment when it really took off? Was it winning that zoo contract?

[B]

Yeah, I think so. So at the end of year one, we were run rating at 1.5 million. At the end of year two, including the zoo, we were run rating at 5 million. And at the end of year three we were approaching 10 million. So we had some really quick growth going off the back of those. Now what's beautiful and why investors love facilities management is we have long term contracts that are five to seven years long. They're on notice periods, but generally they don't get exercised unless something bad has happened. And they're substantial contracts. You know, the biggest one we sold was a 30 million pound contract over five years. So actually they can have some really sizable funds that go through there. So for us. Oh, sorry. Yeah, I moved a little bit.

[A]

Maybe move your chair in as well because you might be just pushing the thing behind you a bit. That's all right. You're right. Yeah, that's good.

[B]

I'll go, I'll go back to.

[A]

We good?

[B]

Yeah. The best thing about facilities management contracts is they're long term contracts. So they're five to seven years long. They are hundreds of thousands if not millions on an annual basis and they're tied in and actually they're linked to various SLA service level performance and key performance indicators and things. But they're good and you know that if you win a contract you can continue to build. But Pareto. So from the standing start, every quarter for 10 years straight, Pareto grew 10 years straight every quarter. And some years we grew 300% as I mentioned. So trying to keep hold of that growth was really quite difficult. And I'm just an entrepreneur who started from my bedroom. I didn't necessarily know what I was doing, but it really took off after the zoo and then we quite quickly got to 20 million turnover and then. And then that's a remarkable record.

[A]

Every quarter was ahead of the previous one for 10 years.

[B]

Ten years? Yeah. And it included in Covid, if I can add, and in Covid, all the offices were empty. So basically in Covid, it was a very challenging time as it was for all businesses. And most of our clients sent everybody home as they had to by law. So we work with all our customers to say, right, we can furlough the staff, we can send our staff home, we can claim the furlough credits, we can give it back to you, all those different things. And we retained all of our customers in that time. If I go back to big business for a second, what didn't work in Covid is the large providers generally were saying to customers, our notice period is six months. If you want to change anything, you need to give a six months notice. And of course that upset customers quite significantly. We'd said to all of them, we'll change it tomorrow as long as we can mutually agree what we're going to do. And so we went into Covid on 16 million, came out around 18 million turnover. And then off the back of COVID we'd won a lot of customers who were disillusioned with the big businesses. And we grew from 18 to 32 million organically in one year. And then we did 42 million the year after and then nearly 50 million the year after that. So we had a huge growth off the back.

[A]

So looking back for what I've just heard, you'd credit some of that growth to being sort of customer or oriented and flexible.

[B]

Yes, hugely. Because other, other competitors in the sector, they weren't. And actually we were gaining a reputation that if you wanted to do it your way within services, you came to Pareto. But we also had a brilliant social heart and we were a great organization and great marketing and stuff that came with it. But that is what you did. You, you came to us and we would build something that had been broken for a long time. And in a facilities management business, you generally have one central computer system, which we call a CAFAM system. We had 11 because customers wanted to do it differently. So we just changed ourselves every time. And what was really unique about us is if their customer had their own system, we would just operate inside their system, it permitting. And it's one of the biggest challenges to facilities management. So, yeah, that worked. That worked really well.

[A]

Adaptable.

[B]

Very, very adaptable. And it sounds really simple, but the sector hadn't seen an organization like that before. And because I was still in my early 30s, this was also very new and exciting and I was talking about things that people weren't Talking about. And that's where the, the environmental and social stuff came into.

[A]

So you had this great run, but in 2023 you decided to sell the business.

[B]

Yes, that's right.

[A]

So how did you come to that decision?

[B]

And yes, look, the truth is I've been running hard for nine years and we'd made a great. Made great growth and, and it was a point where if I didn't sort something out, my conversations with my wife and divorce were going to get very difficult because I was just all in. And I'd had two kids by that point. I had my daughter in 2019 and son in 2021. So what that meant to me was I now had this biological pull that I hadn't had before with the children and I wasn't getting the balance right to start off with because I would come home just before 7 o', clock, bath my daughter, give her back to my wife, and then I'd carry on work until midnight or whatever I was doing. Just for context, I was an entrepreneur that was up at 5 and went to sleep at midnight and then did that for every day. And even on.

[A]

You're now talking five in the morning.

[B]

Five in the morning? Yeah. Yeah, I was four or five hours a night's sleep and, you know, taking a lot of caffeine and things to, to keep going. So.

[A]

So that's not sustainable.

[B]

Absolutely not. No, no. And I, I do believe in entrepreneurship. There are times when you need to be unbalanced because you need to outperform your competitor. Doing things quicker, doing things more detail, doing things better, I think you should do. But there's only so long you can run at that before you ruin all your personal relationships. My wife, your own health probably, and your own. Well, yeah, and I'll talk about my health as well because I went on a big weight loss journey in between all this too. So I think, yeah, for me, that, that become quite difficult and quite strained. And I'd said to my wife in about 2020, about 2020, in the middle of COVID I said, I just need three years, just give me three years. And I got three huge wall charts showing the next three years and I drew a big red X on three years from that moment. And I said, I'll be done by this point. And luckily it only took two and a half years from there, but. But I got out. So it became to a point where I knew it wasn't sustainable. I knew that the business was valued at a level that I would make a significant return so that I was Very happy in my late 30s.

[A]

So were you the sole shareholder?

[B]

I would. No, no, there's various shareholders. We'd split it between us. We'd given 20% of the business to the team as well because we had that senior leadership team too. So no, there was a wide cap table on what we were doing that was split between us. But I like that because we were. Even though we made say $100 million in total, it was split across many people. And that was brilliant from my perspective.

[A]

Lots of winners.

[B]

Lots of winners. And also for anyone who does ever go and sell a business and you get eight figures in your bank account one day, you feel a lot less guilty when there's people around you that are also jumping up and down because they're paying their mortgages off or they're buying a new car or whatever it is that they wanted to do. About a year before the exit, we hired a new C suite of the whole team because I knew that at exit I couldn't be the center of attention because that wasn't going to be sustainable for the longer term. So we hired a brilliant C suite and it was a really diverse group of people, about 15 people in total that we had across the. The senior and director team.

[A]

And that was the team of the future.

[B]

That was the future team. And actually for any entrepreneur who goes to try and hire their own replacement, a CEO, that's also an interesting endeavor

[A]

to go down because what advice would you give me?

[B]

They'll never be as good as you are and try and see the best in them. But also you don't have to be their best friend. Right? You're there. If I may be crass, they're there to perform a function so you can exit. So whether you entirely agree with what they're doing and whether you think they're absolutely perfect, your opinion sort of irrelevant now. What's relevant is how are they going to be seen to investors in the future. So these things can work. And that is a really important piece of advice. It's difficult to take because especially with men, men being men, it's difficult for us to think other men might be able to do what we do in a. In a different way. So yeah, we did that and we hired a great team and I agreed to stay on as a non exec as part of the deal. So I didn't want to leave in time.

[A]

Vice chair, is that right?

[B]

Oh, vice chair, yeah. So still non exec today. And so I go to the board meetings and. But I don't have any Operational day to day. Now I just advise, which is great. And I also chair the Institute workplace, as you mentioned at the start, so those roles really go hand in hand, very nicely. So, yes, we managed to get our exit. And for anybody who's ever sold a business, the due diligence process to sell it is very, very challenging. You have about a million pounds being spent on fees to exit the business and PWC come in and Deloitte come in and the banks come in and ask you all these difficult questions. You have no idea what they mean. When we sold in 23, there were 856 questions we had to answer as part of the due diligence process and we did that in just over three weeks and we exited. We managed to execute the deal in that. It's one of the fastest deals I'm aware of that's happened within the sector. And then. And then that was it. And then that was in November 2023. And then I took my step back at that stage and that's when I would say I semi retired.

[A]

You're a young man now. You were younger. You were 37.

[B]

37 when I finished, yeah.

[A]

So what are you going to do now? I'm mystified.

[B]

Yeah, I. I'm still working it out. Look, I. It really weighed heavily on me that I wasn't a good enough father because I wasn't there enough. I was not prioritizing my kids and I wasn't prioritizing my wife and even my family. Go back to the family unit that I mentioned at the start. In my family, it doesn't matter how much money you've got, it matters that you're part of the unit and you're part of the group and you look after each other. And if someone needs taken to the airport at three in the morning, there should be three of you putting their hand up to do it. It's that sort of environment. So the last two years, I've literally just gone back to being a dad. I'm just doing my. Because my kids were 2 and 4 when I finished, so taking them to school, making their lunches, cooking dinner, going swimming, doing the homework, going to play out in the farm, which I'll come on to. But. But being a dad has been the most magical thing and the money is wonderful and the money gives you time back to go and enjoy all of those things, but there is nothing more precious than being with your kids and not having an alarm clock and having a cuddle and them holding your hand as you go into school. I love it.

[A]

And they grow up fast.

[B]

They grow up. And do you know what? My wife's. My daughter just turned 7, and my wife's like, wow, that's flown by. I'm like, no, it hasn't. This has been a long seven years. I wouldn't change anything because our daughter still doesn't sleep today. So we've had a lot of sleep issues. Right. But actually, like, for me, money, I. I've got so many stories for you. But I. I did go and buy a bright yellow sports car, McLaren 570s, with the doors that go up on the side.

[A]

All right. And I still got it.

[B]

No, no, sold it. I felt like a total fraud. Total fraud. I was driving around in this thing thinking, who am I trying to impress? And also, look my. I'm a 6 foot 4 guy with big old rugby legs when I say I went into a showroom and bought it without even driving it. And when it got delivered to my house, I sat in it and I didn't fit in the bucket seat because my ass was too big.

[A]

But you still bought it it.

[B]

Well, I'd already bought it. By that stage, I was 100k in the. In the hole.

[A]

Okay, so don't buy McLaren unseen.

[B]

No, not unless you're. Not unless you're a little bit smaller. They turned it on in the showroom and that was it. I was. I was absolutely hooked. But no, I. I felt in the McLaren, you drove around and people took pictures of you and they were waving at you and all that. I didn't like that. I love the anonymity.

[A]

So you thought you might like that, but it turned out you didn't like that. So what do you drive now?

[B]

I have like 10 cars these days.

[A]

So you still like cars?

[B]

Yeah, I still like cars, but they're all different. Different ones.

[A]

I really.

[B]

So the car I love at the moment got an old AC Cobra. It's got like a 6 liter Chevy.

[A]

People still look at that.

[B]

Oh, they do, but I don't take it out too often. But no. Got an old 1959 Series 2 Land Rover with an automatic gearbox and a V8 engine in it to drive around on the farm. To be honest, flashing around wealth with cars is not what I'm about. I. I'd much prefer to have. I sometimes take the old Volvo out, which we use on the farm, which is like a 2009 Volvo that's got175,000 miles on it. It's a great fuel efficiency.

[A]

Keep running.

[B]

They do. They just never Fail. My Jaguars have definitely be the ones that I've had to replace engines and stuff in that haven't been so good but so yeah, really what it sounds

[A]

like you're a fan of British cars which we should applaud on this podcast.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

So you've got a lot of brands there.

[B]

I haven't bought an Aston Martin yet, but I will.

[A]

Do I recommend that?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

One years ago.

[B]

I still have it. I, I really love the new shape of the vantages and everything but if you're not careful, you're spending 220 grand on a, on a car.

[A]

Get a second hand one, were you?

[B]

Yeah, it's better. But I like the racing green and driving in and out of London from Oxford, there's an Aston Martin garage on the left hand side as you come into London. And yeah, I often think as I go past there but right now I don't want to be drawn away by things like cars because I want to be at home and doing the stuff with the kids.

[A]

So this is a big change in sort of speed for you and focus.

[B]

Enormous change.

[A]

But you're happy with this. What's that sort of inner entrepreneur doing in entrepreneur now? Getting sort of bits of twitchy.

[B]

Well, no setting is setting new challenges for myself. So I just go back to my health in the lead up to selling the business. In 23 I went on a diet and I lost nine stone in seven months. Wow. In totally no Manjaro, no nothing literally. Or woke up one day and I go, right, I'm going to just have 500 calories a day. I'm going to eat at one time a day. And I just did. It came off sugar, caffeine, alcohol, literally nothing. And yeah, lost a load of weight in that time. Got down so low. My wife was saying, I'm not attracted to you at this, at this physicality. So put a stone back on. But that was a challenge for me. And now right now my challenge is making sure that generally I'm doing things between nine and three because I can take the kids to school, I can come and have conversations like this and I can grow my profile. But the reason I want to grow my profile is I am nothing special. I didn't come from a special background, I didn't have any support along the way outside of the norm. With the right mindset, I believe people can do the same thing. But I also think you have to be ready to go all in at some times to actually sacrifice other things to be a success. So it's not as if someone gave me a million quid and then I started a business off the back of it, I was there on day one. And the advice I want to give to people is for when you come out of your apprenticeship or university or however you come into the workforce, go and work somewhere for a few years, learn how business works, what's good and what's bad, and then start to build your personal brand on someone else's time, where they're paying your salary, and then get ready to go, and then get ready to start something yourself. Because I think a lot of people, what you don't want to do is wake up when you're in your 50s or 60s and go, Ah, should have taken my shot when I was back in my 30s. And I'm quite philosophical these days about business, because I think your 20s is a great time to start and fail, because maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. You've got nothing to lose, really. 30s and 40s, life gets busy. Probably going to get married, probably have kids, probably going to have a mortgage, all those things, I think. And I'm just about to turn 40 now, but I think into my 50s, when the kids have grown up, they fled the nest and I've got a load of time back again. I think I'd be a really good entrepreneur again at that stage because I've learned it all. You've already made some money, there's not too much risk around it. That may be what I'm aiming for, but right now I am holding myself back.

[A]

So you're not. You're not doing a bit of investing with the process?

[B]

Oh, I do a little bit of

[A]

investing that can lead you into new entrepreneurial ventures.

[B]

The investing. I'm trying to invest into a children's home at the moment, so I care about kids and looking after people and building good homes. And there's a brilliant couple of entrepreneurs that need to start. Want to start a children's home, a couple of hundred thousand to get it off the ground under SEIS investment, which is brilliant as well for anyone looking at investment, so that sort of thing. But the key is I'm not involved. I don't want to be doing anything day to day. I'm not trying to get dragged in because I know what I'm like.

[A]

But you're very interested still, I understand, in sustainability, social enterprise.

[B]

So the other thing I've done is I. I bought a farm, so an equestrian facility over in Oxford, and I planted my forest last year, which 86% of it died over the Summer, because it was so dry. Just replant it now. Shout out to Lloyd, thank you for helping us with that. And. And actually we just bought a nature reserve. Just agreed on it yesterday. So it's about a five acre nature reserve with a natural spring pond and 200 meters of. Of stream that goes through the middle of it, completely undisturbed, loads of old trees. That is really interesting to me because we want our kids to plant their own vegetables or plant trees and see them die and realize that climate change is real. And actually, what I love about my son, he's really picky about what he eats. So give him a fish finger. He won't eat it. It. But if he's.

[A]

I haven't heard many parents say that.

[B]

Well, yeah, go out, go outside where we planted some carrots. He will pick a carrot out the ground without even washing it and eat it.

[A]

Oh, okay.

[B]

And I'm like, luca, how are you eating a muddy carrot? But you won't eat this processed stuff that we're trying to give you at the same time. But no, they're good for him. Yeah. And. And look, he. He's fantastic from that. But he'll always eat some Haribo as well. Of course. But in Pareto, one of the. The tricks that I used to use is entrepreneurs. If you're small, when you see big businesses work out what they're not very good at or what can they, what are they trying to hide that they're not good at? My competitors had a carbon footprint on Scope one and two of over a million tons. The big companies did. Our carbon footprint was 169 tons. So quite often, and this worked. I used to take 5,000 jelly beans into a sales pitch in a big old bucket, nearly five kilos, and say, here is the carbon footprint of the competitor that we also know is bidding for this job. Can you guess how much ours is? And ours is one third of a jelly bean compared to 5,000.

[A]

Well, so you had a big jar and then one third.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. And I'd usually cut it. I'd take a pair of scissors and cut it so they could eat some. And like, if you care about sustainability, which some clients claim they do, who are you going to choose? 1 million or 169 tons. Months. And sometimes that worked. Didn't always work.

[A]

You can look this data up in their reports.

[B]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. The data is very easy to find. And so, yeah, I. So for me, like little tricks like that. The other trick I used to use, which is, I think, good advice was donuts. So I'm a big food guy. Going back to that community thing. I always without exception would go and get donuts with the branded logos on of the customers that I was selling to. And then when I went into a sales pitch with them, I'd give them the donuts. And the extra kicker on that is always take a gluten free option and a vegan option. Because there are really powerful signs that if I go in to meet someone who I've never met before and they happen to be celiac or happen to be vegan or dairy free, I've already thought of their needs before I've met them. It's just so deep on like a level that they're thinking, oh wow, this person's really thinking outside of the box. Really basic stuff, but actually like it was just a way that we were able to demonstrate why we were different to the competitors. And whereas our competitors would go in with like eight people into a sales pitch, we'd maybe go in with three. So it was all about quality and we weren't trying to hide anything and we were experts in everything. So there's a huge amount of psychology about sales pitching when you're doing tendering. And we were successful at it. And at our height we were winning 8 in 10 tenders when the industry average is like 2 in 10 at that sort of level.

[A]

But the service must have stood up on its own.

[B]

Well, it did. And on the service we had our net promoter score externally validated on two occasions. The industry average motor score in facilities management is minus 10 and ours was plus 60. So we were able to evidence externally validated wise that we were better than most of the sector. And you could speak to our customers because they talk about us and that's what net promoter score is for. So yeah, we had about a 90% retention rate of customers at our height. And that's how you grow a business. You win work and you don't lose it and then you just keep growing from there. And because the contracts were five to seven years long, you had to, it was pretty hard to lose them unless you were terrible. And we weren't terrible. So actually we were doing a lot better than other companies.

[A]

Right, so now you're non exec and you're obviously focusing a lot more of your time on family and your forest and farm, which sounds fun. What do you think is happening in the sort of world of offices? You know there's a hybrid working. Yeah, two days a week. We mentioned earlier, what's the future for offices.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. Well, as chair of the Institute of Workplace, this is something that we're talking about every day. What I have seen in reality is Mondays and Fridays are almost not work office days any longer. I'm generalizing of course, but we know large customers that have less than 15% occupancy on Mondays and Fridays, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursdays. The twats, as they call them, they, they do come in on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursdays, and that tends to be a higher thing. So. So we are seeing the younger generation generally wanting two or three days in the office. We're seeing some of the older generation also want that. Because where Covid was big for this sector of workplace, people who were in their 50s, who'd been going to a workplace for 30 years, all of a sudden in Covid, they didn't need to go anymore and they realized that they could do some of their work from home and that. And there was a lot of retirement earlier than what we'd expected within, as a population within the uk. But the middle group, so sort of people between say 25 and 45, we know they do want to be in the office and that that group is still there because that they call them generation Y and a little bit of X, those ones want to be there. My other hypothesis is the alpha generation, which will come after generation Z, as we mentioned. I think they will also want to be in the office space. So what we definitely saw a shift from is say beer Fridays in the office and now beer Thursdays. And because probably people are working from home on Friday, people may stay later and they may do more social activities because it doesn't matter the next day because they can sleep in a bit more because they're not traveling to the office. We are also seeing customers or clients, they want much higher quality space. So although they may not have as many desks, the space that they do have is higher quality because when those people are in the office, they need to have a brilliant experience whilst they're there there. And that this not not new, that the likes of Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc had these amazing office spaces because that's how they attracted talent. But even more now, the office needs to do more for people than just be a place to rest your laptop down. And the quality of the interactions on those Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursdays is really important now. And that could be you need more quiet rooms, you need more coffee stations, you need more sofas, you need more PlayStations, whatever it is to make people interact with each other. I think that's more important than ever. And. But it's a constantly shifting thing. And Barclays commissioned a piece of work called Five Generations in the Workplace. And the real challenge. And I don't know the answer to this but how do you build a workplace that works for a 21 year old and a 68 year old? It's a challenge because they have completely different expectations of the space. But that's what organizations need to continuously adapt and not cut their office desks down too much. If you cut all your desks down on you, then get to this point where people don't want to come into the office because they might not have somewhere to sit. And now the whole thing just gets a bit ridiculous.

[A]

We're in the process of refurbishing our office. Yeah. At the moment. And it does raise a lot of questions. It's quite interesting. How do people move through it? How are they going to meet? Where are the sort of workspaces?

[B]

One of the best I ever saw and this was back in 2016 was candy crush or king.com so they. Candy Crush was the second most downloaded app in the world at that stage. But they never met their customers because their customers was people like my mum at home spending 99p to go to the next level. But it meant that in the office it was a stunning place. They had a 3D printing room, they had an amphitheater so you could put on performances. They had a PlayStation room, they had ping pong tables and flooring tables.

[A]

Literally sounds like dreamland.

[B]

It was. They had amazing showers, they had an amazing gym and they still have that space today. But they got acquired by Activision and then Microsoft now. But that environment was like nothing I'd ever seen before as a young entrepreneur. Going in and delivering to them and actually. But the quality of what they were delivering. And they were one of the most financially successful businesses that there had been from an app perspective. The brilliant entrepreneurs there. But that's what office space was like. It was a destination to go to be with people as opposed to just somewhere that you were going to do some work. And what they did really early, they did food. So like proper, high quality, like you go into a sandwich shop grade food. And I always remember they had a nut bar. So every possible type of nut that you could imagine in a big jar which would cost you hundreds of pounds if you were to eat them. Just have them for free. Just put them in and do it. And they were trying to encourage people to come in and it was like

[A]

introduce a nut bar as an idea.

[B]

Yeah. If you want to burn some money,

[A]

I don't want to do that.

[B]

Wolf walnuts and all that sort of

[A]

stuff are healthy, aren't they?

[B]

But, you know, people care about their health and certainly now, and they care about, you know, chia seeds and all that sort of thing. So you, you can do those things. But yeah, nut bar was. Worked really well for them.

[A]

Very good. Well, I think we're, we're near the end of the conversation just to, to wrap up, you know, looking forwards. What, what would you, what would you say to prospective entrepreneurs? Your journey's been remarkable one, I must say. But what, what advice would you give prospective entrepreneurs who, who may be thinking, should I? Or Shantai.

[B]

Yeah, for entrepreneurs who are thinking about it, I think depending on what type of business you have, you can start to build on the side of your desk. So there's this phrase that the Internet loves. It's not what you do nine to five, it's what you do five to nine. I buy into that a little bit. Bit. You don't have to take the risk of just leaving a business and starting with nothing. You can start to build a website, a brand, get your social media up and start to do that on the side and start to see whether that, firstly, do you like working 12 hours a day? Because that's at least what you're going to be doing at one point. Secondly, do you love it? Is that something that those four hours after you've come back from your day job, can you commit to spending time on this? And thirdly, what sort of traction are you getting? Getting? Is it working? Is it not? How can you pivot? What can you do? And actually that means then you can test a lot of that on the side. So perspective entrepreneurs, for me, firstly, probably go and get a job in the sector that you're trying to build your own thing in and start to build a brand for yourself while someone else is paying your salary. But secondly, build on the side. Build on the side and build something that you can test so that when you start on day one, you are not at zero. You may already be at level two out of 10 at that stage. Stage. And then you try and promote it and move forward. So. But overwhelmingly go for it. If you think you've been inspired by what I've said today, the story I've given is all true. I don't come from anything special. I am nothing special either. You just have to work incredibly hard and be focused on what you're doing. You will make sacrifices and you will lose Some friendships and things along the way. But personally, I'd much prefer to work really hard for 10 years and finish working at 37 than Bumble along for 45 years. And my dad was in the factory for 42 years until I gave him quarter of a million pounds in cash on a quad bike one day so he could retire. And I didn't want that for myself. And I think entrepreneurs have the opportunity to do that as well.

[A]

So your message, which I love, is overwhelmingly go for it.

[B]

100.

[A]

Thank you very much, Andrew, for coming to talk to me. I thoroughly enjoyed that conversation. I'm gonna ask you two questions at the end. Okay.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Which I ask everybody, all of my guests. And the first one is, because at Reed, we love Mondays, is what gets you up on a Monday morning.

[B]

Well, these days it's my daughter. My daughter runs in about 7 o' clock in the morning. If she slept all night and then jumps on me and gives me a hug. And then my son, who's five, he'll come and start wrestling and tickling. And that is what gets me up on a Monday and sounds like a lot of fun. I absolutely love it. In that moment of warmth and embrace, you forget about the money, forget about the success, forget about the bright yellow sports cars. Nothing matters. Being in that moment is what matters.

[A]

I think that sounds perfect. And my last question is a question from my interview book. Why you. 101 questions you'll never fear again is where do you see yourself in five years time?

[B]

In five years, I think I'll still be doing what I'm doing now, which is trying to balance fatherhood. Probably understand that my kids don't want to know me as much as they do at the moment, as they get a little bit older, but still feeling like I have some purpose. We're planning to get some animals this summer as well, so the farm will start to grow itself out. We're looking at pygmy goats as our first off a soiree. But really, I. I hope to see myself as happy and content and still spending as much time with my family as I can and really not putting myself under too much pressure. I'm really enjoying where I am at the moment. And time flies now because I'm a couple of years into this story and it still feels like last week that I sold the business. And I love that for myself because there's no pressure and it's great enjoyment. And also I hope to continue. I'm one of the biggest blood donors in the world at the moment. And managed to donate 100 times in the last 500 odd days. And actually I want to continue that and help more people. I've saved over a thousand lives already and hopefully go on to save thousands more and that's an important endeavor for me.

[A]

You've done that by being a blood donor.

[B]

Blood donor, yeah.

[A]

So that's something for people to reflect on. You say you've saved how many lives?

[B]

Over a thousand lives, yeah.

[A]

As a blood donor.

[B]

As a blood donor.

[A]

That's remarkable.

[B]

I donate every couple of. Yahoo just did an article on me as well last week which was very funny because they were our second customer, Yahoo. But yeah, I was just in the press last week about that as well.

[A]

Well, good for you and I hope your family and farm continue to flourish.

[B]

Thank you so much.

[A]

Thank you, Andrew. Thank you very much. Thank you, Andrew, for joining me on All About Business. I'm your host, James Reid, chairman and CEO of Reed, a family run recruitment and philanthropy company. If you'd like to find out more about Andrew Hulbert or Reid, you'll find links in the show notes. Thank you for listening and see you next time.