When Charlotte and Luke Giddings launched Brownie and the Bean in 2019, they had no idea of what 2020 had in store. Yet support from BGCN proved invaluable in helping this company effectively diversify into a thriving enterprise.
Taking Luke’s mother’s secret family brownie recipe and launching a mobile café based around their amazing brownies was proving to be a great success. Then bam! 2020 struck, and like all businesses, Brownie and the Bean needed to swiftly alter their original recipe for success in order to survive.
Diversification
The University of Suffolk introduced the couple to BGCN coach, Brian Bush. Brownie and the Bean utilised Brian’s expertise to help steer their enterprise into a new and successful direction. Understanding they needed to somehow diversify their mobile café, Charlotte and Luke quickly began looking at delivering brownies from a website, instead of a café.
Brownie and the Bean are now a successful online-based enterprise offering fantastic brownies in the post to the public and wholesale clients. They now have a powerful e-commerce website, structured to accommodate free delivery, subscriptions and one-off purchases.
Working with Brian and BGCN afforded Brownie and the Bean to be, “Introduced to lots of helpful people who’ve been able to help us waste less time searching for answers.”
When asked how BGCN directly helped, Charlotte stated that Brian, “Understood our business, he is incredibly well connected and gave us confidence.”
Accountability
Running a successful business requires having the strength to be culpable and answerable to your own actions at all times. Constantly measuring your actions with a coach ensures consistency and better end results. Ensuring accountability also means actions are followed-up and not simply left to fester, resulting in a lack of direction and focus.
“Brian helped to keep us accountable and also introduced us to lots of people who were experts in fields we were researching. He completely understood our business and where we want to be; keeping us accountable and helping make lots of introductions.”
How using a coach can make the difference to a company’s future
Brian helped Brownie and the Bean remain focussed on the business, whilst working in the business. Not an easy accomplishment, but with the right coach supporting alongside, responsibility to the company’s future can be achieved.
The right coach should have a large pool of connections to help foster lasting relationships in key places to progress the organisation. A coach should also challenge an organisation to ensure they know exactly the direction they wish to proceed, but at the same time, build confidence so the team can rise alongside their growing enterprise.
Brownie and the Bean are now a commercial success, still making Luke’s mother’s mouth-watering brownies, adding more to their menu such as fudge and hampers. They are also increasing their offering to include corporate gifts, wholesale requirements and branching out to embrace wedding and events to their growing portfolio.
If you have a growing business and would like support from a BGCN coach, please do get in touch.