Following B-School, we’d made a decision to close our bricks and mortar shop to focus solely on our online shop. This was for reasons of juggling three children, creating a work-life balance and allowing us to grow freely online without the restrictions of physical space (at least not the space a customer sees!)

And this really worked! We instantly doubled our turnover month-to-month between September and December, then we hit January and started tripling. It was fantastic!

But as a business owner, the journey of learning through business, doing B-School, reading, learning, being coached and mentored, also led me to do something brave. I’ve decided to sell the fantastic brand of House Envy that we’ve created. My goal is to focus solely on my freelance career as an interiors journalist, stylist and consultant.

House Envy raised my profile and has given me an amazing experience in creating a new brand. But I realised what I love doing is being impartial. I love writing about all of these fantastic shops, brands and products. That was my ‘aha moment’ where it hit me that selling from my own brand was going against my journalistic tendencies. It was essentially going against doing what I love doing: scouring the trends, visiting the trade shows, creating relationships with brands and working with them to shine.

So, I made the decision to be true to myself and say ‘whilst I have LOVED every minute of creating my own brand, House Envy, it’s now time to sell it, let someone else take it into this next exciting growth period and I am going to focus on creating ‘me’ as a brand once and for all.’

So from B-School, from House Envy, from all the experiences that lead us on our own journey, gosh, we have learnt massively. And what I’ve learnt the most? Be 100% yourself.

Fifteen years ago I became a single mum at 23. I am now happily married with three children. But, in that moment I realised that whatever I did for a living I had to love passionately with all my heart to make walking out of the door something I could do every day when I went to work. And that has never left me.

You have nobody else to answer to, especially when you are an entrepreneur, and every morning you wake up you owe it to yourself to love what you do.