A New Venture

Story contd

Mary and I agreed a date to go down to Worthing to visit her old friend Ellie. They had known one another for years and Ellie, whose husband was a master at a renowned public school, had made a nice little earner for herself over the last few years. She had started a shop with a partner, based on the old thrift shops out in Germany, where I think the partner had been an army wife. The idea was you had a shop and accepted children’s outgrown clothes and sold them for the client who then received payment - with a percentage going to Ellie and partner. Basically it was school uniform but as time went on they included all children’s clothes especially ski and riding attire.

Ellie took us to see the shop which was bustling with mothers and children and was obviously providing a deep felt need. Like us they had many schools in the area from prep schools, grammar schools and public schools all of which demanded a uniform. No way was it an old clothes shop – the key was quality and the clothes should be in perfect order and dry cleaned. At half the original price customers realised what a good deal it was and, as I already had discovered, many of them were struggling to pay the fees to educate their children privately.

Over coffee I told Ellie that as both of us had large houses we could have the shop at home and cut out the expense of premises. Ellie was horrified.

‘Are you serious about running a business or are you just playing at it? You have to have premises and run it as a business. And are you sure you can run it together? You are working happily together now but you Mary are working for Pat. Are you planning on being equal partners?’

We assured her we were.

‘Well get yourselves a partnership agreement then.’

It seemed that Ellie and her partner of a good few years were now having difficulties which were beginning to seem insurmountable.

‘It’s when you start being really successful the trouble starts.’

Back at her house she showed us some of the lovely things she had bought recently but she was nervous and worried and I thought what a pity that success had brought two friends to the point of litigation.

It was time to leave as we both had to pick up our children from school. Another thing Ellie had pointed out was that she and her partner were older, with their children off their hands.

‘You need a third partner who has no children. Your business needs to be open normal shop hours and she can do the hours when you have to pick up your children.’

Somewhat chastened we contemplated running a business form 9.30am to 5.30pm, six days a week with a complete stranger. A bit daunting but I could see Mary was as excited as I was. I knew we could do it and couldn’t wait to get started but Ellie had given us excellent advice and we needed to give the whole project a lot of thought.

I picked the boys up from school and after I had given them tea and bathed them there was just time to have supper with William and give him a brief outline of what we planned. He wasn’t sure how I would be able to manage but it was a rehearsal night at the theatre club so we postponed the discussion.

Pete the director worked in television and was often late for rehearsal and I was deputed to be acting director. I really enjoyed this and had bought a whistle to get the cast to quieten down when I wanted to give direction. Much more fun than props and I determined to learn as much as possible about putting on a play. The leading actor Alan Burns was a solicitor and during a break I asked him if he had much dealing with partnership agreements.

‘All the time - in fact if more people had them from the beginning half my work would be cut out.’

I told him what we were contemplating and asked if he would be prepared to act for us and he agreed.

That’s the solicitor sorted now all we needed were premises, a third partner, a name, stock… oh and some capital. No problemo!