Here’s how to get funding, start and grow your business in Ireland.

A business loan
If you need money to start or grow your business, start here.

First steps – start your business plan
To raise finance you need a solid business plan. Writing a business plan can seem daunting so here’s a brilliant, easy-to-use, free business plan template for the Irish market.

Your marketing plan
This should be an integral part of your company plan. It shows potential investors that you know how important sales are to the survival of your business. Download it here.

Your cashflow planner
Cashflow is the lifeblood of any business. This free template will help you through the tough times as well as the good times.

And don’t forget, banks and investors want to see cashflow plans. A cashflow plan could be the difference between getting an overdraft and not getting one.

The Creeper Crawlers Case Study

Having studied the importance of crawling for brain development, Ollwyn Moran was aware of the detrimental impact alternative activities such as ‘bum shuffling’ can have. While buying strips of carpet so her children could achieve the ‘optimum’ crawling phase of four to five months, she had her ‘eureka moment’ – specially adapted baby clothes with grips on the knees.

She set up Creeper Crawlers in 2012 with €6,000 which she won in a Student Entrepreneur Business Plan competition, while studying for her Master’s in Education at NUI Maynooth. Based in the Guinness Enterprise Centre in Dublin, the business employs four people, sells online internationally and in store through Mothercare and other good independent retailers.
What’s your business’s elevator pitch?
We’re an Irish company that develops and manufactures products for the baby market to aid and enhance a baby’s natural developmental stages. We’re all about what’s best for baby, and are currently developing a range of products for that all-important ‘creeper crawler’ age group.
What do you regard as your business’s greatest achievement?
We were named one of the top five baby safety products in the US in 2014. As a result, we were invited to participate in the luxury lounge (where nominees receive goody-bag gifts) at the Golden Globe Awards in LA, so that was pretty great.
Winning the business plan competition got the business started, so that’s in there too, but really, being stocked in Mothercare was the big one.
What was the lowest moment?
There have been a few. Not getting that funding you expected is a toughie, as is not winning that sale you went through three meetings to make. But to be honest, it’s all part of the entrepreneur’s journey. Between production difficulties, sales challenges and funding issues, there’s always a hurdle to be jumped. That’s just how it is.
How have you coped with setbacks?
My Mum and Dad are amazing people, and they’ve backed me every step of the way. Whenever things get bumpy my mother always tells me that the darkest hour is just before dawn, and it’s true. A day or two after something not great has happened, an email will come in about a sale and you’re back on track.
You have to accept that it’s a rollercoaster. Possibly the fact that I don’t come from a business background helps me cope. I have no expectations of how things should or shouldn’t be, I just deal with it as it comes because I don’t know any better.
What’s your attitude to risk?
I take it. You have no choice in business, you have to feel the fear and do it anyway. Everything I’m doing in this business is outside my comfort zone, but it’s all a calculated risk. It’s about taking the risk, but minimising it as much as possible.
Who has inspired or motivated you and why?
My parents. What I’m doing wouldn’t be in their DNA at all, they’re very much ‘permanent and pensionable’, but throughout my childhood I saw my father work hard by day and go back to college at night to advance in his job.
When he had done that, my mother went back to college in her 40s and trained to be a teacher and had a long career in that. They have a total ‘can do’ attitude.
What is your biggest challenge?
At the start it was hard to get people to take me seriously. I think they thought, ‘Ah, here’s another one who has had a baby and is looking to make a cottage industry at her kitchen table’. That’s not what this is. My aim from the start was to build a scalable international business.
What kind of marketing is most effective for your business?
Digital. Facebook and Pinterest for talking to my target audience here, Instagram for the US and Twitter for talking B2B (business to business). Any time we’re mentioned in a newspaper I see a spike in sales too, but not so much with some magazines, interestingly.
What do you do, if anything, to switch off from the business?
When I’m at home with my boys the phone is turned off and put in a drawer. I also love running without music, as it helps me process my thoughts.
What would you do differently if you were starting your business today?
I’d be less of a Bambi. I’m very open with people. With me, what you see is what you get. I’ve had to learn that not everybody is like that.
What lessons have you learned in business that others could apply?
It’s important to have faith in yourself. If you work hard it will pay off in the end, but you have to believe in yourself first, and for a long time I didn’t. It’s possibly because I’m an accidental entrepreneur. I did this first and foremost to help kids. I had to learn I could do this.
Finally, if there was one piece of business advice you’d like to give to another business owner, what would that be?
Build yourself a great team. I have a fantastic team now, and it makes all the difference.

Courtesy of Think Buisness.ie

https://www.thinkbusiness.ie/articles/business-growing-from-crawl-to-sprint/?gclid=CPvkna__lMsCFWue2wodpsoA_w