When is the best time to start your own business?

Every morning it seems we are assailed by more headlines of inflation, cost pressures and the looming threat of recession.

At a time when things are so tough and the outlook is arguably even worse, is now really the time to launch your dream business?

Brian Gregory, a teaching fellow and entrepreneur in residence at Lancaster University Management School, has a very human comparison to draw when it comes to the question.

"If we thought about it, we'd never have kids,” says Brian, a former Scots Guardsman and firefighter who went onto launch his own fire safety businesses.

“In business there is never a right time. If you're starting off today, it's difficult. However, there are great opportunities for people that have got the right service, the right product being delivered in the right way. Lots and lots of brilliant businesses are born out of recessions.

“This is a time where you can really make hay because lots of organisations will be putting up the defences and shoring themselves up. If you're going out there and being active, upfront, and sharing your information and your good news, then you've got a chance to get a real toehold within your sector.”

However, to do this successfully there are a few key pointers to follow.

"There's an awful lot of excitement, energy and romance when you're starting up a new business,” says Brian.

“So probably one of the principal things we need to keep in the background, or perhaps the foreground, is being prepared to face up to your fears and face the fear of failure.

"We'll make decisions that won't work. Accept they've not worked and move on. Face up to our fears, rather than burying our head in the sand and pretending everything's going to be okay.”

In order to do this, Brian says business owners need to carefully monitor a number of factors.

“Things like client trends and client movements,” he says.

“What are they doing? What are they talking about? What do they say they're going want?

“When you're starting up a new business you romantically assume people want your products. Now more than ever before we have to get out into the market and make sure we have the products or the services that people are actually going to want to buy because trends and movements are changing, perhaps weekly at the moment.”

At the other end of the scale, new businesses need to keep a close eye on their supply chain and potential issues which are coming down the line which may affect them.

Although this may sound relatively simple in principle, forecasting is very difficult for businesses which are just starting out.

"That’s why the big thing for new businesses is cash flow and having a good cash flow model," says Brian.

“It’s about understanding what money I've got coming in and what I've got going out, who's it going to and critically, when is it going? So if you've got bad news coming to somebody that you can't afford to pay, you're talking to them well beforehand.”

In these scenarios it is particularly important to develop a good relationship with clients and suppliers so you can negotiate around issues.

Having good discipline around prompt invoicing and payment reminders was also vital.

“Make sure you give your client every opportunity to get that money and get it paid on time,” says Brian.

To help new businesses make good decisions in this and other areas, Brian says they should cultivate networks of people who they can draw on for advice and guidance.

Sometimes this could be simply in return for a cup of coffee, on other occasions a quid pro quo of help and advice.

“You need to consciously create and nurture your network so that there are people around you who are experts in what they do, so that they can help you,” he says.

“You've got to be free with your information going back again. Entrepreneurs are very good at learning. They're very good at asking questions. So make sure you ask questions of your network if you're unsure, but equally when your network come asking you questions, you've got to be free with your time and you've got to be free with your information.”

As well as facing up to the potential problems and failures, Brian says businesses need to be alive to what he calls the “pixie dust” when things are going well and the business is in a purple patch.

"Why? What's happened? What have I done? What have they done? It's looking at the times when you or your business is running like a well oiled machine and really trying to understand the why, not just accepting that I've had a good week this week. Then you can start to look to replicate that."

One person who has taken the plunge is 25-year-old Clyne Albertelli, from Whitehaven, who launched his business Co-Lab Engineering in June.

Co-Lab works with businesses to run collaborative programmes focused on solving industry problems, while also training and developing workers at the same time.

The process begins by identifying a specific challenge from a sector such as nuclear, oil and gas or renewables and then bringing together SMEs, larger organisations and academic institutions to try and solve it. This serves to not only come up with a solution to a real world problem but also as an opportunity for professional development.

Clyne is planning to put the process into practise for the first time in a six-week engineering academy in October and is currently seeking the right industry challenge and partners to work with.

The company raises revenue from those involved in return for helping solve the challenge or for the training benefits.

Before starting the business, Clyne was a solutions manager at Sellafield Ltd, meaning he brought teams together to quickly overcome problems.

"The role that I'm stepping into as a business owner is very much inspired by the role I had at Sellafield," he says.

"My view was that we needed to expand that to other industry sector organisations to get the benefit of this approach.

"For me, it's actually the perfect time to be starting this business when you consider the national challenges that we've got with the upcoming infrastructure investment around the UK and the skill shortage.

“My business is very much trying to help tackle some of that in a broad sense from a problem solving perspective. There's lots of opportunity out there to develop solutions and cultivate the next generation of engineers that are going to come through to form a community that can solve any challenge.

"These challenges, whether we're in an economic crisis or not, need to be solved and need to be addressed.”

Another new business owner, Kaylie Jackson, began Carlisle-based handmade bathing products business Oak and Stone Organics in 2020.

Prior to setting up, Kaylie studied holistic therapy and then worked as a mental health occupational therapist.

However, she experienced strains on her own mental health during the pandemic as she juggled working from home and caring for her then two-year-old daughter.

She pooled her knowledge into making all-natural organic skin care products with essential oils, with a focus on improving people’s mental health and physical wellbeing, allowing her more flexibility to care for her daughter.

The fact people were spending more time online during the pandemic, as well as focusing increasingly on their health and wellbeing helped give the business a boost in its early days.

Kaylie says challenges have arisen as normality has returned and the increased cost of living is making people consider carefully what luxuries they can allow themselves.

“What may be considered a luxury, people can't necessarily afford that, so we are definitely seeing more challenges,” says Kaylie.

“Predominantly up until now, I've always sold online. But now I'm starting to look at more wholesale stockists, so getting those products out into shops, but then also looking at craft markets as well and just trying to look at lots of different avenues and new ways of working."