An Entrepreneur “must have”

You’re probably thinking I would say coffee... partly true but not entirely. Ultimately, it’s Passion. It’s quite an overused term in entrepreneurial circles. We go to great lengths to tell everybody how ‘passionate’ we are about what we do, and if you’re not passionate you may as well go home. There are bestselling books, such as Grant Cardone’s ‘Be Obsessed or Be Average’ which tell’s us that passion is the #1 key to success. 

However, passion is a popular subject amongst entrepreneurs for a very good reason, because it’s true. Starting a business is a bumpy ride, and sometimes it’s only your passion that keeps you going. In this article, I want to talk about my passion, where it comes from and how it helps me build EspressGo. 

Why is passion important?

There are so many reasons why you have to be passionate about what you do when you’re building a startup.

Firstly, as I briefly mentioned earlier, growing a company is hard. You face so many obstacles and setbacks. You have to grind and hustle, and you often feel it’s all for nothing. It requires dedication and sacrifice of time and money. It takes everything you have, physically, emotionally and mentally. If you don’t have a passion for what you do, you won’t last. 

When you’re passionate about something, you’re naturally confident and enthusiastic about it. You don’t have to try, you just ‘are’. This passion comes across to everyone you meet, whether they’re investors, your team, customers or anyone. Your passion inspires confidence and gets people to support you. Your passion is contagious. It grows and it multiplies. All you have to do is follow your passion. You feed it by doing what your passion requires.

My Passion

My passion for coffee and business comes is deep-rooted. I was born and raised in the UK, but my roots are Italian. Neapolitan, to be precise. I was brought up in the UK by my grandparents who owned an Italian restaurant in Marlow, and my family in Naples are retail store owners. Business is in my blood, but so is something else…

When you’re Italian, coffee is more than a hot drink. It’s life. Everything revolves around coffee (and food of course!). One of my fondest memories growing up was being in my grandmother’s shop as a young boy. Everyone would gather in the middle of the shop for an espresso break and chat away about their day. Sometimes, the waiter from the coffee shop down the road would deliver espressos before the evening rush. Whenever I smell espresso, it’s hard not to be transported back to that wonderful place. 

While my family loved their coffee, and their social lives revolved around it, they were first and foremost business-people. My grandad is an inspiration to me in that respect. He owned a restaurant, and seriously, he was the hardest-working person I’ve ever known. It wasn’t hard work for the sake of it though. He focused on quality in everything he did. He knew that if you gave your customers the best experience possible they would return and they would tell their friends. That’s how you grow a business. 

When I first thought of the idea for EspressGo, on the beach in Ischia in 2010, I knew it was more than a half-decent idea, it was going to be my passion. If I could start something combining coffee and business, I knew it would have a great chance of succeeding, because the passion will always be there. It’s been a long road since then, but of course, the passion still burns. I have a genuine belief that EspressGo improves our customers’ lives. I know that EspressGo supports small business when we partner with great independent coffee shops. 

Further Inspiration

One of the entrepreneurs I’ve been following lately is Brent Hoberman. Brent started lastminute.com, and now runs Founders Factory, a startup incubator backed by some of the biggest corporate names. I really enjoy reading Brent’s articles and watching his videos, there’s great advice in all of them.

Like me, Brent was inspired by his family. His grandfather built an empire of 650 clothes shops from a single store, over in South Africa. Brent also believes that it’s passion that makes a business successful. He said that if you can build a business that solves a problem you actually have (as I did when I couldn’t order an Espresso on the beach in Ischia), you have more chance of staying passionate and achieving success! I couldn’t agree more!

Having recently met the team at Founders Factory, I rekindled a rare feeling when you enter that work floor. A similar feeling when I joined Meraki, its something I call “Hustlers Paradise”. In short, a place where similar minded hustlers come together to make an impact in a huge industry - for the better. Their vision to create an interactive dining experience through automating the user experience with the latest modern technology. Using robotics and AI to enhance and reinvent one of the worlds largest industries I am excited to see what the future holds at Founders Factory!

On the other hand…

It’s important to have a bit of perspective on this, however. Passion alone can’t get you to the top. In some cases, too much passion could even be a bad thing. 

Sometimes your passion can cause you to be blinkered. Your passion may drive you to keep going when it actually may be better to stop. Your passion could make you stick to a particular path when if you just changed your focus slightly, you could achieve greater success. 

Tony Robbins said, ‘Don’t fall in love with your product.’ I’d add, “Fall in love with your customers instead.’

Be passionate about what your startup does for your customers, rather than the startup itself.

What’s Your Passion?

If you’re thinking of starting a company, to be extraordinary you need to have unshakeable passion. Locate your passion. It’s in there somewhere. It could come from your upbringing as it did for me, but it could just as easily come from something you’ve experienced later in life. Once you’ve found it, do something that feeds it. Ignore the naysayers. Start something.