Diary of an SME Owner – "What makes you unique?", the world's most unoriginal question
Michael was happy, then sad, then happy again, then a bit meh about his 48th birthday.

Diary of an SME Owner – "What makes you unique?", the world's most unoriginal question

In this instalment of my regular monthly column, “Diary of an SME Owner”, I continue to tell all about the highs and lows of relaunching and running a tea company, MDTea , alongside my wife, Helen.?

This month, I have a run-in with some yoots and meet one of the biggest of the hospitality sector's Big Cheeses.

October 2nd?

A couple of months ago, I was listening – rapt – to a hospitality podcast as an Irish hotelier told of his Napoleonic rise from office junior to overseer of multiple famous venues by sheer dint of his willingness to say “Ah, g’wan then, I’ll give it a go”. Given libel laws exist, let’s call him Hotelly O’Hotelface.?

I take risks – and most fail. In fact, Diary, if you are ever published, you should have the subtitle “Tales of Gross Miscalculations and Blunders”. So this “Ah g’wan then” strategy is something I’m sure I could embrace and I wanted to know how it might help MDTea grow.??

I emailed Hotelly, saying I’d been inspired by his ideas and would like even more to meet him so we could talk about MDTea and so he could give me some career-defining advice. To my surprise, Hotelly O’Hotelface, the Most Hardworking Man in Ho-business, agreed to see me four weeks from today at one of his swanky five star destinations in Piccadilly.??

October 3rd, my birthday?

The sun has removed his hat and gone to bed 17,533 times in my life, yet I have never felt the intrusion of age – until today.

I was manning the shop this morning and it was quiet, as it often is on Tuesdays. At times like this, I tend to have a mental intray of sales and marketing or admin deadlines to occupy my thoughts. Sometimes, inconsequential questions invade my head, such as: “Where was Apocalypse Now filmed – surely not Vietnam if the war had just ended?” Or: “Do they use feet or metres in Afghanistan?”. (Praise be to Google!).

However, on this occasion, my thoughts turned to whether a 48 year old should be running what is effectively a start-up. Shouldn’t I already be a success by now? Have I left it too late? What if it doesn’t work? Is this my last shot at success? I have no children, so what mark will I leave on the world? Am I the only stable point in a moving universe (but not in a good way)???

Anyway, three skateboardy students came in. They picked up everything, and put things back in the wrong place. Their rucksacks swang round centimeters from expensive glassware. Being old means I have empathy and an ability to read people’s intentions – so it was obvious to me the little fuckers weren’t interested in buying anything.??

“Mate, what’s the point of tea – coffee’s nicer,” one of them said, smirking.?I didn’t just nibble at the bait; I wolfed down the hook, the line, the sinker, the rod and the fisherman. If there’d been a fishing boat, I would have swallowed that too.??

“Tea has many health properties that coffee doesn’t. It’s full of antioxidants and has anti-inflammatory properties,”?I offered pessimistically.

“Ooh I don’t like the sound of that,” another of them said as they left giggling noisily without saying goodbye or thanks.??

And it dawned on me that being old is a source of satisfaction as well as worry; satistfaction at not being not a little shit anymore.??

October 17th?

Diary, you must think me obsessed with the weather but I spend a lot of my time looking at it and I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a prolonged period of heavy rain.

I pine for the sun-dappled hills of Tuscany, the white sands and lapping waves of southern Sicily or the warm twilight buzz of glamorous Amalfi.

As it’s only you listening, Diary, I feel no need to scribble ‘hashtag first world problems’ on these pages as I lament the lack of time and money that start-up life affords for proper sunshine holidays.?

October 30th?

Normally, I read slowly but on the Brighton-to-London train this morning, I optically inhaled just about everything that has ever been written about Hotelly O’Hotelface to prepare for our meeting.

I found a dry-cleaning receipt from 2019 in the right breast pocket of my suit jacket and I realised it had been years since I’d dressed so uncomfortably.? As I completed the final mile on foot, across Green Park, I rehearsed my script, waxing and waning between supreme confidence and debilitating fatigue and terror.??

At a little past 11am, I was perched across a table from Hotelly O’Hotelface, bitterly rueing my order of coffee (what sort of tea mogul was I?). But Hotelly was disarming, friendly and charming, as successful Irish business folk often are. We had an easy and pleasant five minutes of small talk, despite the topic being how he’d agreed to too many meetings that day and was in a massive hurry.??

“I won’t take much of your time then,” I said. “I just wanted to tell you a little about MDTea and to ask for your advice on how a business like mine,” meaning my actual business, “could get into hotels like yours,” meaning his hotels, specifically.?

“What makes you and your tea unique?” came the response.?

Ah shit. It’s an obvious question but one I can never answer adequately. How can giving people tea be unique? Seven billion kilogrammes of leaves are consumed every year on this planet.

That’s about three and a half trillion cups – or around 1.5 cups a day for every man, woman and child on Earth. And we are known as a nation of tea drinkers! We neck 100 million cups a day. Statistically speaking, the average British adult is more likely to contract rabies, win an Oscar or marry a grandparent on any given day than forgo their beloved cuppa.??

So how can the business of supplying tea be unique? I suspect this puzzle has stumped honest businesswomen and men since before money was invented 3,000 years ago.

But maybe it’s a question that doesn’t mean what it says, I reasoned.

The word ‘unique’ doesn’t even mean unique anymore (a caller into LBC’s breakfast show this very morning said to the presenter, unironically and unchallenged: “I’m uniquely positioned to answer your question…just like your last caller”). Maybe unique just means “good” or “interesting”???

In case you’re wondering, Diary, all this went through my mind in about three seconds, which is about two and a half seconds longer than it should take to answer an enquiry like that without making everyone concerned feel awkward.

So I knocked a glass of water over to create a distraction, mopped it up with a napkin and, in the mild confusion that ensued, answered a question I had not been asked. After all, when you can’t answer a reasonable question with a reasonable answer, it’s probably the wrong question.?

“A lot of suppliers will offer you wonderful blends and single leaf teas. What’s different about MDTea is that we imbue a real enthusiasm and love for our tea products – your tea products – into your serving staff. We train them, educate them and…” I paused, adding gratuitous suspense to a moment that needed no gilding, “…leak the love we have for tea into their souls.” I smiled as though I’d laid an impressive egg.?

Hotelly, pleased with my answer, followed-up: “Interesting. And tell me, Michael, what problem does MDTea solve?”?

Again, I knew the honest answer – “your guests sometimes want tea and we have it” – surely could not be the right answer. Nor could “we have the best tea available” (not true), nor “we have the best-priced tea” (also not true).

But I had grown in confidence and, again, I answered a different question from the one I'd been asked, referring to our particular love for client hotels that had a connection to their communities and to the land they’re built on – like Hotelly O’Hotelface’s hotels. It was sincere and I think Hotelly liked that answer too.?

I am writing these words, having secured the result I wanted from the trip. Hotelly wants to taste our teas alongside his food and beverage buyer and has requested a sample box be delivered to his office. I am to call him in a month to seek feedback.

Back to statistics: there’s at least a 75% chance established businesses, like this hotel group, will not take the products of tiny start-up suppliers in the infancy of their lives, like MDTea, no matter how good those products are, nor how well they are pitched.??

But, that’s okay. So often, the fun is in the journey – not in the destination.?

You can read more of Michael's diary at Mouthy Money .

Stefano Passarello

Accountant and Tax expert | Crypto Tax Specialist | Board Member | Co-founder of The Kapuhala Longevity Retreats

12 个月

Well shared ??Back to statistics there’s at least a 75% chance businesses like this will not take the products of a tiny start-up supplier in the infancy of its life, no matter how good they are and how well they are pitched.??

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