BUSINESS BUDDIES CASE STUDY
Elizabeth Edwards, Bassinets and More

Five years ago Elizabeth Edwards left her job in customer service and started a business hiring out furniture and goods for babies and young children.  Her goal was to have flexible work hours so that she could spend more time with her own children.

Elizabeth's father had worked in the same industry so she knew it was a viable business idea, but it took a couple of years to get the business fully established.

Elizabeth then decided she wanted to increase the income from the business.  She set this as a goal with her life coach who suggested she seek advice from Business Buddies to help her reach it.

'I lacked planning and strategy skills and knowledge, 'says Elizabeth. 'There wasn't really any structure to the business - I hadn't stopped to look back at things, neither did I have a plan or strategy for the future - so I needed to address these issues.'

Elizabeth was teamed with Business Buddy Ray Moore, whose expertise and experience assisted Elizabeth to evaluate options for growing her business, improve her time management, and learn how to plan.
 
'Ray helped me learn to distinguish between good and bad sales, and I applied this to concentrating on profitable sales.  He assisted me to do more focused marketing, and I applied this to my advertising strategy - the vast majority of my advertising budget is now targeted straight at the parents of babies and young children.'

As well as learning how to market her current range of products more effectively, Elizabeth was also encouraged to add new products to achieve further growth.  

'Ray advised me to consider enhancing my product range with complementary products - which I looked for and implemented - and now I have increased the average income per customer hire.  This particular strategy has also increased the level of service provided to individual customers as they can obtain more goods in one place.'

Elizabeth particularly valued the ability to talk to someone who was as interested in her business as she was.

'I enjoyed having the opportunity to discuss issues and be challenged in business areas, as being a small business owner can be very lonely in terms of business interactions. The fact that you are in ongoing communication with a Business Buddy gives you incentive to implement the things that you talk about, and so you move forward.  The meetings are inspiring and you become more enthusiastic about what you are doing as you can see the results as you make changes and implement good ideas. 

In the future Elizabeth will seek other complementary opportunities to grow her business, and anticipates using the Business Buddies service again to develop a sound strategy and plan for future growth.

'I have become far more competent and confident in my business since I started with Business Buddies.  It has been the biggest help to me of anything I have done, and working with Ray has been fantastic.  A deep level of trust has developed between us, and I believe that this is a major factor in the success of our partnership.'

                                                                       Back to Top