A young entrepreneur who launched her own hair products business as the pandemic struck has been named as one of the 海角视频's most inspirational female founders.
Abi Reid, a 33-year-old mother-of-two, set up Merwave during lockdown in 2020, having just returned to work following maternity leave. The business, which is run out of her Cullercoats home, is now set to turnover £1m this year and the founder has just scooped one of eight titles at the national Everywoman Awards.
Speaking to BusinessLive following her win, Ms Reid said she set up the business out of frustration at the lack of products on the market for women with wavy hair, like herself. She said: "I spent so much money on Amazon buying all the products but nothing really worked. I had an idea and I knew what I wanted, but it was a massive risk.
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"I started looking for suppliers in the 海角视频, because I wanted a supplier based here, and they were all minimum quantity of say 10,000, 15,000 units. All I wanted was five products. I thought: 'That's a lot of money and a lot of products' and I don't have anywhere to put them."
The groundwork for the business was done while Ms Reid was working as a marketing manager for a housebuilder and eventually she found a supplier based in Spain. Through trial and error, she worked with the supplier to develop a suitable product and came up with the name Merwave.
She added: "It was all new to me. Even things like learning how to trademark names - I've never made my own business before. My mum was a nurse and my dad was in the police. It wasn't like I came from that background of entrepreneurs.
"My husband was very supportive and he had to be because I became pregnant with my second child and I went back to work. But I got the final products, got the design and everything done and got the delivery. At first we were storing it at a friend's gym down the road from the house and I was doing all the picking and packing."
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Since then Merwave has become a full time job for the Northumbria University graduate, having built an sizeable customer base across the country who buy her five core products that are distributed from Gateshead. Some of those customers belong to the brand's 6,000-strong Facebook group for wavy-haired members who share advice and tips about haircare.
For now the business, which is said to have made a net profit of £100,000 in its first year of trading, is run by Ms Reid and her husband, though she is eyeing a possible future move into the Australian market. Her story caught the attention of judges for the national Everywoman Awards which celebrate female entrepreneurs in all sectors and are sponsored by investors BGF.
Ms Reid was recently at Grosvenor House awards night were she collected the Artemis Award - a category that singles out the most inspirational woman running a business trading from 18 months to three years.
Maxine Benson, co-founder of Everywoman, said: "For the past 20 years these awards have provided a platform to share the stories of hundreds of entrepreneurs; encouraging, emboldening, and empowering other women to follow suit. We are thrilled to celebrate the winners’ success and hope their experiences will go onto inspire others and provide the motivation that will strengthen the backbone of the 海角视频’s economy."
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