Red Network Event: Be Your Own Boss with The White Company’s Chrissie Rucker

This Wednesday marked our 5^th Red Magazine’s Red Network Event in London. We first went along as enthusiastic and excited women about to embark on our journey to start our own business in 2012, and almost two years later we sat and listened to one of the most inspiring talks yet. Chrissie Rucker, founder of The White Company was interviewed by Red Editor Sarah Bailey at the Conference Centre of the British Library and here is a collection of the advice that we left with, as we excitedly travelled home as we always do after a Red Event overloaded with new ideas and the confidence to make them happen.

Twenty years ago Chrissie Rucker began what she calls a bumpy journey to create something she wanted herself; simple white sheets which quickly grew into the concept of somewhere where you can get everything in white, because "there is a place for white in every home whatever your style". This year marks 20 years of The White Company with 52 stores, 1200 staff, 12 stores in Dubai and a brand that is known for providing beautiful things to buy that aim be used and loved every day. The future looks very exciting as Chrissie announced that the brand is about to launch in the US and has created The White Heart foundation to support four charities that help vulnerable children and provide support for women.

So here is what we’ve learnt from Chrissie Rucker in 40 minutes, although we’d very much like another 40 minutes with her!

As two people who want everything tomorrow to happen today, it was great to hear from Chrissie that The White Company has grown safe and strong in 20 years, realising the importance of building a strong brand in the UK first before trying to go global, and that steady growth doesn’t mean it’s going to take such a long time to create something you love, in fact it’s the journey of growing the business and brand that is important.

We were so happy to hear that one of the most crucial elements to success for Chrissie was to live, sleep and breathe as your customer, which is what we always do. In fact we have learnt we are much more passionate about our products if we are the customer in the first place. The White Company often calls on feedback with customer focus groups named The Kitchen Table and Chrissie rightly said “You are nothing without your customer”.

Next year will mark Katie & Jane’s first adventure employing staff, and, with that in mind it was so interesting and reassuring for us to hear Chrissie’s issues in the early years of learning the art of delegation and accepting the things you aren’t very good at. 20 years on she believes the most powerful thing you can do is unite your staff as a team and include them in creating the five year dream and vision for the company to keep everyone motivated and excited to make it happen.

Finance is always an issue that people face continually during the journey of owning your own business, especially if you are a big dreamer and things aren’t happening as fast as you would like – life is short after all! However, Chrissie has always rejected the private equity route and instead managed to survive with her own investments and small cash injections from award wins and a bank overdraft. This really gave us something to think about and realised how admirable her journey really has been. I think we wished we were just as calm and sensible as she appeared, however we know to be that passionate about your dream you have to be absolutely obsessively 200% into making it a reality – which she shared with us later on in the evening.

When talking about her products, we were so inspired and reassured by her confidence at buying in carefully selected products from suppliers rather than manufacturing them. The brilliance of hunting down the same suppliers that make bath robes, towels and bedding for high-end priced designer brands and selling them direct to customers for a more accessible price while still building a solid, strong and beautiful British brand was really one of the stand out moments for us, we also loved hearing how she shared the same love for simplicity as us too!

As customers of The White Company it was hard to think about ever seeing the brand make a mistake, however as we know when creating a business mistakes happen all the time. It was good to have some sound advice for us to refer back to in times of trouble “Things go wrong the whole time, have the state of mind and attitude to look at what has gone wrong, learn from it, put it right and say sorry as fast as you can… part of the learning curve is not to make the same mistake again in future.”

Sometimes we both struggle with priorities in our businesses, especially because we want to do 100 things all at the same time, but Chrissie has learnt it’s better to focus on a smaller amount of things that could make a much bigger difference if improved and tackle them in one year, rather than do lots of things mediocrely.

When growing a business you either have to have a fantastic product or an outstanding service (or both!) with which you can then grow a team around but Chrissie said it’s also important to develop a group of people or mentors who’s opinions you value and can trust. As Chrissie said “You are only ever as good as the people you have around you at work and at home too”.

Two pieces of advice when running your own business was to “never be afraid to ask for help”, and I think the most simple, but most encouraging piece of advice I’ve heard in the last two years… “You learn to get better at it”.

Inspired herself by Estée Lauder, having started selling lipsticks, and grown to an infamous global brand, we shared her thoughts even after only being in business for 2 of her 20 years when she said: “The beauty of having your own business is that you get to choose. It’s a very bumpy journey and it is at times very hard, but at times it's just so incredible.” For us those incredible times more than make up for the hard times, we are absolutely addicted to them!

One thing we are really going to try harder at following Chrissie’s advice is to learn to celebrate the good things, sometimes it’s very easy to pass those things by!

Here’s to our 2^nd Birthday on 1.1.15, and hopefully many more years to come!

Thanks Chrissie,

Katie & Jane x