Episode 3 Peter Jones Meets...

Big business is tough, but I believe there are certain factors that give

us all a fighting chance of turning our dreams of success into reality.

I'm on a mission to get inside the minds of some of Britain's

most successful entrepreneurs and find out how they made it.

I don't remember really being content. Enough is never enough.

I'll be studying their personalities

just as hard as their business models.

I didn't know my father from the age of two.

In a bid to unearth what drives these diverse characters,

I'll also be asking some difficult questions.

-We run a pretty tight ship.

-Is it tight or is it...controlling?

And I'll be finding out how they survived

when they faced the biggest challenges.

-You were in sinking sand as a business.

-Totally.

And now you're at a point where you are about to lose everything

you've worked for your entire life.

-Yeah.

-Tell me how you felt at that point.

You feel absolutely awful,

but you realise that you have to survive, you have to get through it.

My goal was to find out if it's our individual DNA that

controls our destiny or whether there is a blueprint for success.

How are you? Nice to see you.

Tonight, two entrepreneurs who have learnt that making

money in the baby and children's market is far from child's play.

I'll be meeting internet games guru Michael Acton Smith,

whose playful approach to commerce almost cost him his company.

I had to go to the board and tell them, "You know

-"that £6 million you gave me, well, most of it has gone."

-What?!

Peekaboo!

And Laura Tenison,

whose business was born out of a near-death experience.

I had this terrible head-on collision.

I broke my ribs, my jawbones, my cheekbones, a couple of legs.

But I survived.

39-year-old Michael Acton Smith

is an energetic and creative entrepreneur.

'We've got your letters!

'We've got ink! We've got live music from the tree house!'

Mind Candy, Michael's web-based entertainment business

and parent company of the online phenomenon Moshi Monsters,

has been an incredible multi-million-pound success.

Its home is here in Shoreditch, the London location for media

and creative business with a digital twist.

-Michael! Great to meet you.

-Great to meet you, too. Welcome to our HQ.

Wow, what a place!

We have a treehouse, we have finds, we have toys aplenty.

With all these temptations to play,

I wondered how Michael persuaded his staff to do any work.

But I was also trying to decide what this playful office

said about his approach to business.

Business is often seen as grey and boring,

but I think business is almost like this canvas that you can paint on.

You can take ideas in your head and put them out on the marketplace.

And I personally just think that's incredibly exciting.

My goal is to discover how Michael manages to mix a multi-million-pound

business with the pleasure of fun and creativity.

And whether it's a blend that, if mismanaged,

is full of potential pitfalls.

A lot of offices are a little bit the same.

-The same carpets and lighting...

-A little bit boring.

A little bit, and we wanted something where people would be inspired

and creative and love working from,

but we also love giving tours to kids.

We give them a tour round the tree house

and they get to see all the Moshi toys and the grass and get to

meet the animation and the creative teams, so, yeah, they love it.

And I don't think we've ever had anyone in a suit. Certainly no-one anyone as smart as you.

-I thought I'd dress up for you today.

-Good!

-Are you going to show me around? I'd love to see the business.

-You bet!

-Let's have a wander round.

-Thank you.

It's fair to say I did feel a little over-dressed.

It looks like everyday here is Dress Down Friday.

I still wasn't sure whether this was a workplace or a playground,

but it certainly suited Michael's approach to business.

Michael's online game and social network for children

has 72 million users in 196 territories worldwide.

But what is a Moshi Monster?

-Shall we have a little game?

-Yeah, shall we have a look?

I've got a monster called Snowcrash.

I can get him to walk around the room by clicking on the floor.

I can tickle him here and he'll giggle away.

It's difficult to imagine me being a six-year-old kid, but...

If I was a six-year-old Peter Jones,

what would I find exciting about a fluffy monster?

Well, we've created a world where children can adopt their own

monster, and they are in charge.

They can feed it, they can play games with it, they do educational puzzles.

And then there's a whole social side, where they can safely chat to their friends,

they can send each other messages, they can share their artwork.

And so how does it work, income-wise, for you?

Is it free at the moment?

Yes, most of the children that sign up play for free.

And then they can get a Moshi Monsters passport.

Parents can pay about £5 a month to access new parts of the world,

to play new puzzles and games and buy new items and so forth.

And that's one part of it.

The second part is the physical merchandise that we've created.

There's a magazine, there are puzzle books, toys...

You're sort of targeting children to get them engaged,

but at the same time I'm assuming your target market is also

parents, because kids go up to their mum and dad,

as mine do to me, and say,

"Dad, can I have £10 for this?" Or, "Can I go online with that?"

It's a really interesting challenge, so we have to make the experience of Moshi fun for kids,

so they fall in love with it and they're

engaged and they share it with their friends,

but we need to make sure parents feel comfortable with it, too,

that there's some kind of educational value to it, which there is.

So we decided to make something that was fun, first and foremost,

with education woven in underneath. We call it stealth education.

Clearly, Michael's canny.

He's not simply selling his game to kids,

he's persuaded their parents to part with their money

and turned his game into a playground phenomenon.

Here's some chocolate-coated broccoli, which we are going to feed.

-Hopefully, he'll like this.

-Chocolate-covered broccoli! Lovely!

In his relatively brief career, Michael has become

successful by putting himself in the right place at the right time.

He became a dot-com entrepreneur in the late '90s, developing an online

gadget business with a student friend he met at chess club.

I think we realised we were pretty unemployable

and we decided to set up our own business.

And we loved toys and gadgets and games.

In 2004, he left that joint venture

and started an online games company that today turns over nearly

£30 million a year and makes around £10 million in annual profits.

My dream, ever since I was little, was to run my own company.

I was one of those slightly annoying kids that was always getting up

to hare-brained, entrepreneurial ideas.

So this precocious kid's come a long way,

and that means that today, people want to hear what he's got to say.

I've tried to retain my inner child as I've got older.

I get very passionate about things.

My work and my play all kind of interact.

But for Michael, this is simply the start.

Our ultimate vision is to create the greatest entertainment

company in the world for this new digital generation of kids.

Moshi Monsters is just the tip of the iceberg.

Michael's ultimate goal may be clear,

but his route there is less certain.

There's no five-year plan for how we're going to do this.

We are very agile in our thinking.

We might describe that as operating by the seat of our pants.

I think you need to be that agile and flexible,

because the world is changing.

My aim is to find out why Michael dares to dream big.

If you can make anything fun, you can radically change behaviour

and perhaps even change the world.

And discover how someone who seems so unconventional has managed

to make millions in hard cash from virtual monsters.

Michael employs over 150 people.

I wondered what it was like to work with a digital Willy Wonka,

and hoped one of his closest friends and his chief creative man,

Steve Cleverley, might help me to find out.

-So what it's like working for this guy?

-Well, it's a laugh a minute.

It feels like...writing silliness with one of your mates.

And there are quite a lot of non-corporate people here.

He's got this Pied Piper-esque ability to reel people in like that.

Michael with the flute and... The Moshi followers.

This is like... This is amazing, isn't it? Is it real work?

-Not really, no.

-That's what makes it good, then!

-It makes it really fantastic.

-Such fun and yet you make money doing it.

I know. What a great gig!

To unearth exactly how Michael runs his company,

I'd need to strip away his playful exterior and find out

whether that's just a front for a hard-nosed businessman.

So what's going on here?

'In Michael's virtual world, rocks are the currency,

'but his business generates real cash from online subscriptions

'and sales of his creations, that are spilling into the bedrooms,

'bathrooms and even kitchens of children worldwide.'

How big it is this now? What's does this generate a year?

Last year we did about 60, 70 million pounds' worth at retail value.

So that's not direct turnover. And then we take a cut of that.

What sort of percentage, what do you make off that?

We make anywhere from 10% on some lines up to

well over 20% or 30% on others.

How do you do it? Do you licence the brand to derive a licensing income from it?

Some we do ourselves, but a lot we give to partners,

and we make sure we have quality control over them,

and then they hold the stock and have the product manufactured.

I like it. So they take all the risk, as well. If it doesn't sell...

Well, that's one way. But if it does sell, they make the lion's share.

So there might just be a business brain behind Michael's

wacky facade, after all.

I reckon he is smarter than some of his products looked.

Before delving deeper into Michael's DNA, I had

an appointment across London with another entrepreneur battling

to win the parents' pound.

Laura Tenison's company, JoJo Maman Bebe,

sells clothing products for parents and children from pregnancy to preschool.

-Hello, Peter.

-Hello, pleased to meet you.

-Come on in.

Her gross turnover is estimated at around £36 million this year.

This is the creative hub of the business.

Here we do the graphics, the design, clothing, nursery products.

Laura trades by mail order, online and in her high street shops.

And, despite the economic downturn,

she is aiming to open 12 new stores a year nationwide.

I want to find out what motivates her.

And I'm in for a bit of a surprise.

So, Peter, this is the wholesale showroom.

-So these are your products.

-Yes.

We do absolutely everything, from maternity to preschool.

We design our own textiles, our own fashion.

-Is the brand JoJo, or is the brand Maman...?

-JoJo Maman Bebe.

JoJo with an English accent and Maman Bebe with a French accent.

JoJo is the funky brand and then the Maman is the clothing for mothers,

and the Bebe is clothing for babies and nursery products.

How many stores have you got now in the UK?

-We've got 50 stores in the UK.

-So you're a chain?

Well, it's a difficult one, that,

because when do you go from being an independent to being a chain?

Obviously, we are a small chain,

but I like to say we are a small independent chain.

Why is that?

Because it's very important that you realise that retail

is about producing a product, an empathy with your customer,

and as soon as you start looking at a retail business as figures only

and take the product and the love out of it, it just becomes a commodity.

And there are too many emotions involved in retail to do that.

It's not just about making money.

You don't see money as being a vital component to the success of this operation?

Being profitable and growing the company in a sustainable manner is vital.

Personal wealth for me, no, I think it's a hindrance.

I think we're going to have an interesting time in this interview!

Personal wealth, a hindrance!

That's something you don't often hear from self-made millionaires.

I get the feeling Laura is running her company for love, not money.

To be successful in business, you need that passion,

but has Laura got a cooler, more controlling side, too?

-This is your catalogue.

-That's our winter catalogue at the moment, yes.

Is this where it all started?

We started with a mail order catalogue, yes.

My first catalogue had 24 pages and about 30 styles.

All the first samples made by me and tested on myself.

The initial collection was far too long for the average person,

because I'm quite tall.

It started with a little 24-pager and it's ended up like this!

200-page catalogue currently, yes.

And we still believe the catalogue is very important for driving sales.

A lot of people drop their catalogues

because websites are the main route to market,

but we find that when we launch a catalogue

we see a huge surge in our online sales and our retail sales.

-So you proof-read everything?

-Most things.

I like to see that everything is tidy

and I really have a very high level of attention to detail.

-Occasionally, I kind of put my oar in and irritate people by making suggestions.

-Really?

I like to be sure the direction we're

moving in is the right one and we don't get diverted.

It's so important to not lose sight of your core brand guidelines.

It seems like you're very active

and see every part of the business before, actually, a consumer does.

I like to be brand custodian.

Laura's business was born 20 years ago,

when she discovered that, at that time, pregnant women had very

little choice when it came to fashionable clothes.

She launched a brand for expectant mums

and their babies based on a classic French nautical style.

I wanted it to be a little bit quirky but quite classic,

and I wanted to make sure that our styles were not going to be fast fashion fads.

Laura's operating in a lucrative market.

Every hour, 74 babies are delivered in the UK,

and it's estimated that parents spend an average

of £1,500 on their children before they've even been born.

So there's big money to be made,

but that means a tight reign on every aspect of the business.

LAURA: Peekaboo!

Right, let's see.

-We can use these for canvases in store.

-Yeah.

From day one, Laura has kept growth slow

and sustainable without losing sight of her principles.

'It's not just about money,

'it's about the people involved in the company.'

We want to protect the livelihoods of our employees.

We want to be a brand that's on the British high street for many, many years to come.

Laura has obviously got a clear vision for her company,

but I am determined to discover where her business strategy

comes from and where it might take her.

Where's Mr Bunny?

There he is, there he is!

This is the Moshi TV Show, take 479. Action!

That's not Simon, that's Poppet. Simon!

-Simon!

-Simon!

-Simon!

I'm Simon, welcome to the Moshi TV Show!

Whoo! GONG CLANGS

-ALL:

-Whoo!

Back in Shoreditch, Michael is keen to show me his new project,

one that he hopes will be the catalyst for an assault

on the big boys in the entertainment industry.

So, this is the Moshi TV studio.

What, this is?

This is it. The Moshi TV empire.

-This is your studio?

-Yes. MICHAEL LAUGHS

-What, this?

-Well, it's a little small.

-That's not your TV studio, is it?

-It's our TV studio, I'm afraid. Yes.

What, a desk?

You don't need much space for a TV studio.

It's one person presenting behind a desk,

one puppeteer under the table, and a simple camera.

-So, let me have go on the TV studio.

-All right.

-This might be my opportunity, Michael.

-Oh, yes?

Smartly presented.

Ready for action.

Hi. Welcome, kids. This is Moshi TV for business.

My name is Peter Jones.

GONG CLANGS

What do you think?

HE LAUGHS We'll see.

'I'm not holding my breath on that one!

'But Michael surely can't be developing TV shows just for fun.'

You're running a serious business, aren't you?

The wonderful thing about the world at the moment is that if you've

got talent, you can reach an audience of millions using the internet.

And it's changing the entertainment industry and many industries

so dramatically, so this is just one small example.

We wanted to create our own TV studio,

and we can reach millions of kids doing it.

It costs a few hundred pounds to create a show.

If it works, fantastic.

If it doesn't work, we just go back to the drawing board and try again.

Since the cost of doing it is so cheap,

we can figure out that as we go.

I can see what you're trying to create,

and I love the fact that you've just got, you know,

this sort of stuff and you're doing it with a £200-300 camera.

Any bigger plans, more than just TV?

TV is great, but a level beyond TV would be to create a Moshi movie.

I love what Disney did. I love what Jim Henson did.

I love what John Lasseter did at Pixar.

These incredible visionaries and amazing companies.

What we want to do is build the boldest entertainment

company in the world for this new digital generation.

'Michael is wildly ambitious.

'How can a company filming internet TV shows in the corner of the

'office and turning over £30 million a year ever conquer Hollywood?'

When you dream, you do dream big, don't you?

I think it's important to dream big.

I think we can build a multi-billion dollar business here.

-You think you can go to multi-billion dollar?

-Absolutely.

Don't you dream big?

I do, but I try to be a little bit more realistic than 30 million to multi-billion!

Well, if we look at Disney,

they have everything from Jungle Book to High School Musical,

to Mary Poppins.

I think that's how you can build a business of substantial scale.

But it took him a good 30-50 years to build this

multi-billion dollar enterprise,

whereas you started with Moshi Monsters.

How long will it take you to build a multi-billion dollar enterprise?

Well, I think, in the digital age, much quicker than it used to.

Look what has happened.

Look at how fast incredible businesses have been built in this internet age.

Facebook, worth billions of dollars, and LinkedIn and Google.

Why shouldn't we build an amazing multi-billion dollar business

right here in London?

The brands that you mention hit a very, very wide, extreme audience,

whereas you hit a very narrow audience

in terms of your marketplace.

-So what are your plans...?

-I disagree.

-Do you really?

-I do disagree.

There are hundreds of millions of children in the world,

and we're not just focusing on the kids' space.

Mind Candy is an entertainment company,

and we want to build entertainment for different audiences, as well.

Maybe teenagers, maybe mums, maybe dads.

Vision, I think, is really, really important within a business,

and ours is to create this greatest entertainment company.

-We call it a BHAG - a big, hairy, audacious goal.

-BHAG?

Exactly. Yeah. I think that's...

I don't know if I've met anybody that dreams quite as big as you.

While Michael is planning world domination,

I'm off to see Laura again.

I'm keen to find out how her business theory works in practice.

'What better way than to ask the people who actually work for her.'

-What's it like working here?

-It's great.

-Imagine the boss isn't here.

-It's a really nice company to work for, genuinely.

-Yeah?

Yeah, it's a really nice atmosphere, everyone is nice and approachable.

-Were you told to say that?

-No, no, not at all!

-She can say whatever she wants.

-You're highly paid, are you?

-It's fashion. Fashion is a vocation.

-You do it...

Everyone could go away and probably more money working in the city.

You don't go into fashion if you want to become rich quick.

I'm looking for some designers. I'm bringing out a new range of stuff.

-Are you interested in a higher salary, working with me?

-Yeah!

-See, that didn't take long, did it?

-THEY LAUGH

I'll leave my card later.

Money often works, but any boss worth their salt will tell you that

keeping your staff motivated is crucial to a successful business.

So, Kath, you ready? We've got the two new stores in this morning.

I've just had a quick chat. We've got Reigate and West Hampstead.

How are your team coping with all these extra stores?

I'm putting too much work on you. I'm sorry!

Yeah, we're bearing up, we're bearing up.

It's something Laura prides herself on, but I wondered

how easy she finds it and what impact it has on the business.

Can I talk about your staff?

Well, first of all, they aren't my staff. They're my team.

I think that's quite important. I do think of them as a team.

I do think that without my team I couldn't have done what

I have done, and I'm just very grateful to them.

Employing people, you do have a sense of duty to everything about them,

so I think what's important for me is working out what makes

our employees tick and how we can help them achieve job satisfaction.

If you have job satisfaction, you want to come to work in the morning.

So, your whole culture or thesis of running a business is

based around happy people?

What if you've got happy people that are rubbish at their job?

If people are happy in their work, they naturally want to do a good job.

We have no desire to employ people who don't want to work for us.

We have an extremely low churn rate.

We've got people who have worked in the warehouse for us

since we launched. I've got three generations of one family.

I've got husband and wife teams.

You know, it's a way of life.

It's a jobs-for-life attitude, and I owe something to those people.

I have a slightly different view on that, in that I wouldn't feel

the same walking into my company when, you know, I've got people

there just because of the fact that they had been there for a long time.

A business takes money and it takes cash to operate it,

and it's enhanced by the people who come on board and grow it.

Yes, but Peter, you're missing the point. Look at my figures.

My return on capital invested has averaged between 30-55% per annum for years.

I have fantastically productive teams.

'I'm pleased to see that Laura agrees that it's not

'just about loyalty, it's also about return on investment.'

Laura started her company in 1993,

turning over £30,000 in her first year.

Today, she employs over 450 people in the UK and owns 50 shops.

She has grown the business organically,

reinvesting profits, and remains largely debt-free.

But in 2009, for the first time, she started looking for an investor.

So you took a minority shareholder on board who made

an investment in the company. Tell me about the background to that.

When I decided to dilute my equity,

it was more important for me to find the right partner

than to just find the right amount of money.

And how did that work?

The one that I actually took was the lowest level of investment,

but they gave me the most freedom.

They allowed me to run the company the way that I and my directors

feel comfortable - for longevity, for investment in our staff.

The one at the top said, "Beware.

"If you accept us as your investor, there will be redundancies,

"your board will change."

They even asked me whether I was keen in continuing as managing director.

Now, what would you have done in that circumstance?

I expect you'd have gone for the company that offered you most money,

thinking, "Oh, well, if we have redundancies along the way, if there's a little bit of spillage,

"if we get rid of the deadwood, fine."

I don't want to get rid of the deadwood.

-Everyone has a value in this company.

-I think that's really...

Listen, it's very honourable.

The reality of business is that you're bordering on the unique

if you think that you can still function and run a successful

business and still maintain an attitude that deadwood is OK.

-Frankly, it isn't, and it isn't in any business...

-Nothing is deadwood.

You may call it deadwood, I call it a valuable member of staff.

I think you're relating everything back to money, Peter.

If you're very simplistic and look at a business purely in figures terms

rather than with emotion, with those important values that

contribute to the longevity of a business... People are loyal

and people do come back from a tea break on time, because

they know that it's going to let down their fellow workmates if they don't.

Laura and I clearly weren't going to see eye-to-eye today.

I couldn't help wondering whether her loyalty to her team

and her values were potentially holding the business back.

Both Laura and Michael share a steely belief in themselves and their companies.

But where Laura has only recently taken on an investor,

Michael brought in investors right from the start.

So, Michael, I'd love to know where it all started, and what was your first business?

I went to university up in Birmingham and met a friend called Tom Boardman.

We had this idea to sell toys and gadgets and games,

and a wonderful chap called Tom Teichman

decided to invest half a million pounds into our business.

We decided to do it on the internet,

which was very new and shiny back in 1998.

The great thing was that there weren't many competitors.

The downside was there were hardly any customers, either.

And then, from there, where did...?

-Well, then...

-What was your next...?

Then we almost lost everything in the dot-com bust in early 2000.

We overextended ourselves, we spent too much money, we got carried away.

We teetered on the brink of bankruptcy.

It was a pretty, pretty scary time.

'Michael's business might now be a multi-million pound hit,

'but he's clearly had more than his fair share of near misses.'

After the dot-com bubble burst,

Michael swapped selling gadgets for developing an adventure game.

Perplex City launched in 2005.

Players bought puzzle cards and followed clues in a bid to find buried treasure worth £100,000.

Amazingly, having nearly lost it all, Michael persuaded his

previous investor and others to give him another chance and more money.

I had managed to raise further financing and, in total,

I had raised about £6 million for this business.

So I got some very well-respected, huge venture capital firms

coming in that invested, between them, many millions of pounds.

So the pressure and the stakes really, really raised at that point.

Did it succeed? Was it good for you?

There were people in different countries around the world helping expand this treasure hunt.

It was a pretty big operation.

Unfortunately, there weren't enough people playing to cover

the costs of running this very expensive business.

What did you...?

You didn't spend £6 million, surely, on a website and a treasure hunt?

-Well, helicopters are pretty expensive.

-What, real helicopters?

Real helicopters. We hired them to do flyovers of these live events we did.

We had a massive burn rate,

and our outgoings were a lot higher than our incomings.

-Wow. £6 million?

-£6 million.

And you can imagine how stressful

and tense it was to have all this money, but the business not working.

Did you lose all the money then?

Well, we had about £600,000 left in the bank. About 1 million.

And how did you front the investors?

Were they camping outside like, sort of, protesters?

Well, we had to go to the board and tell them, in a very stressful

board meeting, "You know that £6 million you had given me?

"Well, most of it's gone. I'm really sorry.

"This idea hasn't worked out, but I have got one more idea.

-"One final roll of the dice."

-What did they say?

I mean, if you came in to me and said, "Peter, it's not all bad.

"You gave me 6 million and I've got 600k left, so we're all right."

No, we're bloody not all right! It's like, what is going on?

I was terrified. But, to their credit, the board were supportive.

You know, they listened and they said,

"Michael, fair enough, we invested in YOU more than the idea,

"and if you've got one more idea, let's see what happens."

-You lucky devil!

-I think if I had screwed up with Moshi Monsters,

there wouldn't have been a third chance, so, fortunately, it worked.

Have you been told that you're mad before?

Erm, well, I think there has always been a very fine line

between insanity and genius, and a lot of entrepreneurs

with big visions kind of weave between that line.

Yeah, yeah.

Insane or genius, Michael certainly doesn't lack confidence.

In his short career, he's been through more financial scrapes

than most people see in their entire lifetime.

It's no wonder he's so self-assured.

Like Michael, Laura's not afraid of a challenge,

and has certainly stood her ground with me.

I wanted to discover where her confidence comes from

and where she learnt her business ethos.

To do this, I needed to find out how she got started.

I'd like to find out a little bit more about the journey,

because, you know, it's quite an exciting story,

and take you back to when you first did your designing

and when you first had those thoughts about designing.

My mother was very forward-thinking. She bought me a sewing machine for my 12th birthday.

In fact, I've still got it today. It's in my office and it still works.

That sewing machine, I started making clothes for myself,

then I would get the odd commission from a friend.

You know, it sort of worked out that way, that I realised

I had a skill that turned into a commodity.

Laura graduated from making dolls' clothes at school to her

first fashion retail job in 1987.

But in the 1990s, her dream of starting her own fashion label

was scuppered by a lack of capital. So Laura moved to France

and started a business renovating derelict barns.

Within three years, she sold the business

and made a much-needed £50,000.

But it was a brush with death that changed the course of Laura's life.

I read that you had an accident. Give me a bit of background on that.

I ended up doing babywear, purely by accident,

because of this terrible car crash I had in France.

I had this terrible head-on collision, broke 20 bones in my body.

You said that quite casually - "broken 20 bones in your body".

That, for me, is very serious.

It did take the firemen about three hours to cut me out of the car.

But quite a lot of those bones were small bones,

so I did one leg in traction, one ankle broken.

I broke a lot of ribs. I broke my jaw bones. I broke my chin.

It was a nasty crash. It was a nasty crash. But I survived, come on!

Were you critically ill?

Ended up spending a few weeks in St Thomas' Hospital,

and my ward neighbour was a mum with two small children.

She was trying to buy clothes for her children by mail order,

and actually, she was my saviour.

She gave me the idea of doing an upmarket childrenswear brand.

And that completely changed the direction of your business in '93?

Absolutely.

I knew nothing about maternity or children. Didn't have any of my own.

How did you mentally... when you had this accident,

how did you mentally adjust and get yourself back on your feet?

After a few weeks in hospital, I said to my consultant, "Right, I'm ready to go home now.

"I've got my business idea and I really want to get on with it. I can't be lying around."

And he said, "Well, Laura, if you can sit up without fainting, I'll let you go home."

So, I fainted a couple of times before I managed to get past that.

I discharged myself from hospital, got home, cried for two days,

cos I realised I should never have done it. I was not ready to go home.

And then I found that, actually, it worked to my advantage.

I was in a wheelchair with my mouth wired shut,

trying to do market research for my new business.

Now, the consumer is very, very kind. I got the sympathy vote.

I would sit in baby shows or on Oxford Street, outside Mothercare...

And you couldn't speak?

STILTED SPEECH: I spoke like this. It was fine.

People would be sympathetic towards me and give me their attention.

I would be very, very scared!

Laura's is an amazing story.

Having nearly lost her life,

she turned her lowest moment into a springboard for her biggest success.

I was beginning to see why her company and team mean so much to her.

Unlike Laura, Michael has always had investors in his business.

I did some digging

and discovered that one of his first investors was a very special lady.

-Hello! You must be Michael's mum?

-Yes, I am. How do you do?

-Is Michael in?

-Yes, he is. Come through.

-Thank you very much.

Just go straight through.

'In 1998, aged 24, Michael was so desperate for start-up capital

'he became a medical guinea pig.'

-Here you go, boys. That's yours, Peter.

-Oh, thank you very much.

'Hearing that her son was being paid to test migraine drugs,

'Mrs Acton invested £1,000 in him and his company.'

-Do you remember that first £1,000?

-I do.

Well, we believed in you and you were always keen to get ahead,

and you sort of knew what you wanted to do, really, didn't you?

-Yeah.

-What were you thinking when you handed over that £1,000?

Yes, I thought, "Well, I'll never see it again!" Boy, I did see it.

Michael was telling me about the times where things didn't go well for him.

-Yeah, after we lost...

-Oh, dear.

Well, you probably shouldn't hear this, Mum. Yeah, £5 million or so.

That was a bit of a stressful time.

-Wow, is this the first time you've told your mum?

-Yes.

You don't really want to go home and tell your parents that you've lost five million quid!

That's going to be an awkward Sunday lunch.

It's going to be a very awkward Sunday lunch,

-but we'd still like to know, yeah.

-Yeah.

-Fair enough.

You had no idea things weren't going well?

With Michael, "Everything is just fine, Mother."

Is that right? You had no idea that he was... Basically, he had almost lost the business?

I know, yes. I didn't know at the time, no.

-Are you disappointed that he didn't tell you?

-Yes.

If he came to you and said that, would that be...?

-Oh, I'd have to give him all my savings!

-Would you?

-Of course, yes!

You would for your son, your child. Oh, yes.

I think it was maybe cos I always thought

-and believed we'd be able to turn it around.

-Right, yes.

-It was just a temporary blip.

-Yes.

Hopefully all will be well now.

-Things are just fine at the moment, don't you worry.

-I'm glad to hear it!

You started short tennis, didn't you...?

'It's astonishing that Michael has only just revealed

'to his mum that he lost so much money.'

But this kind of self-reliance is a part of the DNA of the most

successful businesspeople.

Like Michael, I have also lost a fortune.

But I never stopped believing that, eventually, I'd be a success.

Entrepreneurs can have a remarkable level of self-belief

when the odds are stacked against them.

And I don't think Laura is any different.

She's invited me to Northcote Road, in Clapham.

Nicknamed "Nappy Valley", this trendy street in southwest London

is home to many a young affluent mum and potential customer for Laura.

-Hello!

-Hi, Peter.

-Good morning. Good to see you.

-Nice to see you.

-What a gorgeous day.

-It's beautiful, and it seems a lovely area.

It's great. It's great.

This is sort of Nappy Valley, between the two commons in south London,

and it was a great place to start a baby business.

'It's no coincidence that this was where Laura set up her first

'design studio and now owns two shops within a stride of each other.'

And how did this come up? This was your first one. Why here?

I was trying to get a store here just when the street was booming.

The big chains kept gazumping me and I could never afford the premiums.

But Ted, who had the fruit and veg stall opposite the store,

promised me that the next store that came up that I wanted,

he'd pop in and put a lucky Romany Gypsy charm in.

This store came up, Ted popped in one night, and I got my store.

Lovely Ted. So he started it all for you?

-He got you this store, ultimately?

-Well, another little bit of luck,

but I certainly believe in fate, and we were meant to have the store.

Wow, so it's got a little bit of luck to it, as well.

I was just thinking, you've got this one and that one.

-And you've got a curry house in-between.

-It's great, isn't it?

Our very first store, and it became too small,

so another one came up and we took another one in the street.

So is the idea that you're going to try

and persuade those people next door to sell, or...?

No, at the moment it works quite well having maternity wear here

and the baby and childrenswear two doors down.

-I've made it all this way. I would love to come and see the store.

-Come and have a look.

-Thank you.

'Laura is bucking the current economic trend by opening

'up to 12 new stores a year,

'just when a lot of businesses are shutting up shop.

'But I've already learnt that Laura likes to do things her own way.

'I'm hoping that here, on her home turf,

'Laura will let her guard down and reveal some of the personal

'qualities that give her the strength to survive in business.'

One thing that I have struggled with is,

what really makes your business different?

But I think I'm getting to a point where I'm realising where

your uniqueness and where your difference is.

And I think that the uniqueness within your business

is very clearly you.

Well, thank you.

You know, I never want to take all the glory, because it isn't just me.

The way I have run the company has filtered down to my directors,

my managers, to the supervisors.

And I hope that all of that team will work together to

kind of pass on the message.

There must be a little bit within you that's tough, tough but fair.

I can't see you suffering fools gladly.

I am a businesswoman,

and I think the tough part of me is I won't accept no for an answer.

If someone tells me I can't achieve something or if someone tells me something can't be done, I'll say,

"Well, come on, of course it can," or, "Let me give it a go."

I think that determination to succeed obviously does make me

-a tough person somewhere along the line.

-You like to win?

-I do.

There's no doubt about it. I like the fight. Of course I like to win.

Not at any cost. I do stand by that. Not at any cost.

Do you think you're quite a complex person?

Erm, yes, I think I probably am very complex, yes.

And would your staff say that?

I think what my teams don't see is the personal angst I go through,

and that constant conflict.

In effect, I want to be a full-time mum. I don't have nannies.

And also wanting to be a good MD and not let my teams down.

It is quite a difficult balance,

and I have a lot of personal conflict going on.

Yeah. Do you struggle with that? Do you find that emotionally draining?

I do. I find it extremely difficult.

I don't really believe that women can have it all without making

-quite a lot of personal sacrifices.

-Yeah.

I want to be in charge of the cooking.

It's not that I feel it's a duty, it's a pleasure,

but I also want to earn the money. You know, something has to give.

You can't actually do it all, can you?

For the first time, Laura has started to open up.

For all her protests, it's clearly her vision

and energy that drives the business forward.

But running a company can be all-consuming,

and success often comes at a cost to friends, family, and yourself.

I wondered if Laura felt she had something to prove,

and who she was proving it to.

'Back at Michael's mum's house, it was time to take him to task

'on something that had bothered me since we first met in London.'

-You said there's a fine line between insanity and genius.

-Mm-hmm.

Are you insane?

I think I waver, try and walk the tightrope between the two,

which I think a lot of good entrepreneurs do.

I think I have a very unusual brain.

I think it sees the world in a strange way,

and sometimes that may come across as slightly mad.

-You don't see yourself as a genius?

-Who's going to say they're a genius?

I mean, that's a bit...arrogant.

But entrepreneurs are arrogant. That's one of their traits, surely?

I think they are confident.

It's a really important trait for success, to walk into a room

and have people pay attention when you're trying to raise money

or sell a product, or bring people onto your team.

If you don't believe in yourself, who else is going to believe in you?

And that to me is confidence, not arrogance.

If that's not an arrogant thing to say!

Perhaps a little bit arrogant, but at least it's honest.

Believing in yourself is vital.

Spending time at Michael's childhood home

and meeting his mum made me think about what really drives Laura.

Earlier, she hinted at the struggle she has, mixing motherhood with business.

When first starting out, she even took her newborn boys to work

and today, she still has to juggle career and home life.

Toby, tell me about school today, what did you get up to?

-I had my first biology lesson.

-Did you? And? Do you like it?

I really want you to be a doctor.

You are so much better at school than I ever was.

I'm very, very proud of you.

Laura's father was a diplomat and her mother raised five children

while working for charities and political organisations,

so I wondered what part her parents had played in the development of her business ethos.

How did the relationship between your parents and you...?

Tell me about that? Describe your father, your mother.

My father is very academic and quite cerebral, very self-contained.

My mother was extremely gregarious and she was very, very energetic.

My mother had a huge influence on my life

and also that permeates right through the company.

Our company ethos is what she taught us as children,

to waste not, want not,

and to do unto others as you would have done unto yourself.

So these basic moral issues are the way

that I would like to run my life and obviously my business.

If your mum could say what she thought of you or,

if she could describe you, what do you think she would say?

It's funny because I always felt that

I never did well enough to please my mother, who had very high standards.

But I remember one time,

when I had been in business for about ten years,

and I was turning over maybe about £10 million, employing quite a lot of people.

I went home and she said to me,

-Laura, when are you going to get a proper job?

-What? Wow!

It was just that attitude that running a business

was not a proper job.

How did you feel?

Did that make you feel that you were letting them down a little bit?

Even at my age, in middle age, I still feel that

I am trying to please someone, I am still trying to please those parents.

Did she ever tell you personally, have you ever had that moment?

In the last few days of her life before she died,

I did have quite an emotional conversation with her,

saying that I was sorry that I disappointed her.

She did tell me that she was extremely proud of me,

so it is amazing how, deep down underneath,

she really did value what I had created with JoJo.

How does it make you feel when she said that to you?

Obviously, hugely emotional and hugely relieved.

Maybe I can relax a little bit more but somehow, I don't think I will!

Laura's honesty gave me a fascinating insight

into the origins of her values and drive.

She has been motivated by her mother's exacting standards

and that maternal influence also seems to

constantly push Laura to achieve more.

It is not a surprise to discover that Laura wanted to do better.

Most entrepreneurs push themselves hard.

Laura and Michael are no exception.

For my final meeting with Michael, I was going back to the future.

-What is your favourite? Bernie? The little dragon?

-Yeah.

'He was at his old primary school, testing a new product on the most discerning of judges.'

-Hello, everybody.

-Hello.

-Are you having fun?

-Yes.

-Michael, what's going on?

This is a new Moshi Monsters app and we have come to school

to ask the experts what they think of it.

I love what you just said,

because you described everybody sitting at this table as experts.

-Indeed.

-You're the guy making this happen.

Yes, and we sit in our office, tapping away, making stuff,

and only really when you put it in front of an audience,

do you learn if people like it or not.

Do you do a lot of this? This is obviously important to you?

This is really important, to come and ask the children what they think

and to get their immediate feedback.

So, is there anything on here that you think is fantastic?

Yes, I love that there are loads of different sections,

so there's moustaches and noses.

If the ears don't fit on any Moshlings, you may need to make those bigger.

-I know, I made a note in my notebook.

-You need to make the ears bigger!

That's immediate feedback, that's great.

If that's the only negative feedback, I think we're in good shape.

-It's important, your Moshi needs a good ear!

-That's true.

-So, thank you for discovering that.

-Well done, that's a great discovery.

-Any other?

-You've saved a multi-million pound business from going down the tubes

with that one comment.

We'll have to give you some shares in Moshi Monsters!

'Michael certainly knows that spending time with these children

'is making money for the business.

'Seeing him here made me appreciate that staying young

'and playful keeps him in tune with his customers.

'His Peter Pan persona has served him well.

'But growing his business isn't just about sprinkling fairy dust,

'it's about making some big decisions.'

It's all incredibly exciting because you are moving very quickly.

The business has got a lot of things to get right,

but it is extremely exciting right at this moment.

Tell me about that excitement and tell me where you're going with Mind Candy.

We're at a really interesting point in the company's journey,

a real crossroads, but I think they're on to something here.

I think we can create one of the greatest entertainment companies in the world.

It is a wild, crazy ambition, but we're going to give it a shot.

You really believe you can do this?

There is a long, long way to go, but I think it is important in life

to have big dreams and massive ambitions.

Even if you don't quite make it,

you'll still get halfway or two thirds along the way.

We might not make Everest but we could make K2 or Ben Nevis.

Even those would be pretty exciting.

If the investors that are currently with you today

want out in six months' time or a year's time

because they just don't want to go on this huge Walt Disney journey with you,

-are you looking to float the business?

-Not in the short term.

I think the business isn't quite ready.

I would like the scale to be much larger for when we do float,

but I think it is a likely thing that will happen in the next few years.

Will that be your exit event to get cash out, float,

or will it be a partial exit?

It depends, it's a really tricky question and I give it a lot of thought.

I love running this private company.

Things change when you take a company public

and maybe I don't have the skills or the want to run a public company

with all the extra pressures that that will bring.

The answer is, I'm not sure, we shall see.

If you got a big offer for the business today,

and the offer was big enough, would you take it?

I think it unlikely.

I think we still haven't realised anywhere near our full potential.

It feels to me like we are just on the upward tick of an amazing journey

and it would be a real shame to give away my baby at this specific point.

Michael's plans may be ambitious but I admire the vision

he has for his company's future.

I am pleased to see his emotional attachment to the business

isn't clouding his judgement.

I wondered whether Laura shared a similar outlook.

What was her endgame and did her emotional investment in her company

and the people that worked there ever become too much?

Do you sometimes feel that you are taking too much on,

everything is resting on your shoulders? Do you ever feel lonely?

Every now and then, I get extremely tired because obviously,

when you multitask as much as I do,

you do sometimes have a 24-hour collapse

and that collapse, I will literally sleep

solidly for 24 hours and recharge my batteries and then off I go again.

But, yes, I get depressed.

I don't get clinically depressed but of course you have down times

when you just think, why do I accept all these things,

why do I take on everyone else's problems, where is the shoulder for me to cry on?

So in reality, you put so much energy into everything but clearly,

the company is what makes you happy?

I do have a more rounded life than just running the company.

The company is very much a part of me but my kids and holidays,

travel, the outdoors, is also very much a part of me.

Leading on from that, what does the future hold for you?

It's really difficult because I am very committed to my teams,

I am very committed to the company.

I would hate for a takeover to happen and for JoJo to cease existing.

I think I will just take it year by year and see what happens

when the children leave home.

It's going to be interesting because you have created this business.

It's now moving into its 20th year.

It is expanding, you're opening more stores.

You could find yourself at a little bit of a crossroads soon.

Maybe, but I think the reality is that JoJo will keep growing,

and I would like to remain the figurehead for as long as possible.

I'd like to remain the MD for the time being.

If I was in your position now, I'd start to think,

I've built this business over 20 years, it's growing,

the business, right at the heart, is based around me

as much as it is my people, because they're with me collectively.

Without me, I'm not sure that it really would function.

It would start to concern me a little bit,

looking at five years, looking at retiring.

I'd kind of have perhaps a little bit more of a plan.

And I'm surprised you haven't.

No, I think the reality is that the business is bigger than Laura Tenison

and the business will definitely succeed when I'm not around.

Maybe I kid myself and the business doesn't need me

as much as I think it does.

Maybe I need the business more than it needs me, and that's going to be the problem, isn't it?

If I wasn't needed by the business, then what would I do?

You know, I've got lots of ideas. I've got lots of plans.

At the moment, my main plan is to carry on running JoJo.

And if I offered you 20 million for your business,

would you accept my offer?

No, of course not.

I'm quite happy, you can come into the office whenever you want.

You've got a key to the office.

-Come in and out, do whatever you want.

-Absolutely not.

I need to be busy. Why would I...?

Maybe one day, but right now, we've got a long way to go.

30 million?

No, quite frankly. Do you know what, we're not for sale.

You could offer me 200 million and I wouldn't sell to you.

-You would.

-No, I wouldn't.

-That's a downright lie. Yes, you would.

I absolutely guarantee, I guarantee I wouldn't sell!

You'd be the most stupid person

that ever walked the earth if you turned down 200 million.

Don't even go there! You and I both know that.

-I don't think I would, you know. It would depend...

-Come on.

OK, if you guaranteed my staff, you guaranteed my head office...

Yeah, what?! For 200 million?!

I don't care about the money!

You could give all of your staff a million each.

Erm, OK, I suppose I could, yes.

-Come on.

-If it was 200 million that I was to share out amongst the staff,

-then yes, obviously, of course I would.

-Yeah.

-But you're never going to get that!

-THEY LAUGH

Well, maybe! Don't... You just wait!

Do you know what, I won't say never,

because the rate of knots at which you're growing and the way that you

fastidiously look over the business, without stifling it, I must say...

I don't think you stifle the business at all.

I think your passion is great within the company.

I think, you know, maybe you will get there.

But I do think that crossroads is looming.

I do think you're going to have a situation where you're going to

have to change or take a different route

and decide what you really want to do with this business.

Both Laura and Michael are intriguing characters who have

risen to the top thanks to drive, vision and a little bit of luck.

After some audacious escapes, Michael has learnt to balance

having fun and being creative with some sound business practices.

Probably the biggest thing is not to be afraid of failure.

There's nothing wrong with failing as long as you do it fast

and you learn from it.

Who knows, maybe one day Michael will have achieved his massive

ambition and created the biggest entertainment company in the world.

'Entrepreneurs are hugely optimistic.'

I always hoped I'd be able to build something successful that would have

an impact on the world, but, to be honest, it's probably

taken off a little bit quicker than even I thought in my wildest dreams.

Laura survived an accident that could have killed her,

and created a company that both she and her family can be proud of.

The reality is, when you start a company and grow it,

it's a little bit like having your own baby.

You can see that you nurture it,

and there comes a stage where you have to let it go a little bit.

But, as any parent knows, letting go isn't that easy.

I really love my company. I love the people I work with,

and I'm extremely grateful and loyal to them.

So, it's hard for me to imagine doing anything else.

But every now and then, I do think it would be nice to try something new.

Whatever the future for Michael and Laura, I am certain

the experiences that have shaped their approach to business,

as well as their tenacity, ambition and self-belief,

will serve them well, whichever road they decide to take.

Hi, Peter, welcome. Welcome to Timpson House.

'Next time, I'll be meeting John Timpson,

'whose family business has survived despite a bitter boardroom battle.'

-'My father was fired.'

-'Fired from the business?'

He was even told he had to leave his car in the car park

and he wasn't allowed to visit a shop other than as a customer.

'And Judy Naake, whose pursuit of success almost cost her her life.'

I was so busy, and I'd had this lump in my breast.

-So you realised you had a lump?

-Well, yeah. But then...

-You did nothing about it?

-No.

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