Journalist Victoria G. L. Brunton sat down with Irish entrepreneur Aoife Byrne to discuss her mission to support small business owners.
Like many of the world's bustling metropolises, London's high streets have fallen victim to a host of mysteriously empty sweet shops, unattractive outlet stores, and tourist-heavy souvenir spots.
However, Irish businesswoman Aoife Byrne, along with her business partner Becky Jones, intend to address this with their company, Someday Studios.
Collaborating with Westminster Council, the duo will be awarding more than 20 shopfronts to a carefully considered selection of independent and small businesses owners.
As well as being rent-free, and located in the heart of London, the 4,000 companies the pair work with will reap the benefits of having both Byrne and Jones – both with 20 years experience in the industry – on hand to guide them through any trials and tribulations they may face.
Each lease will last six months with the option to lengthen the stay (which will then require rental payments) at the end of this term.
To find out more about the incredible initiative, and the Irish woman behind it, I sat down with the powerhouse that is Aoife Byrne.
Tell us a bit about your background.
I'm from Dublin originally, I went to UCD and did Commerce. Then, I kind of took the regular route of getting into one of "the big four" after I graduated.
I joined the strategy consulting team in PwC for a while and I absolutely loved it there, and learned so much. Looking back, I think it was probably the best starting point for my career; I got involved in some really monumental projects and stayed for a couple of years before moving on to join another consultancy in London.
I was there for a couple of years before deciding I wanted a massive, massive, massive career change.I wanted to work with small businesses and see how they set up shop, how they launch products, and how they scale their business from one person doing something in their kitchen, for example, to having multiple restaurants or shops across London.
I joined a very small development company called Makeshift who were setting up a site called Pop Brixton in South London. I learned the ropes there quite quickly and was appointed to run a project called Peckham Levels which constituted turning a former carpark of 100,000 square feet into a creative hub of restaurants, workshops, bars, offices and everything in between.
I was responsible for curating that entire project, and that was kind of my lucky break into getting to work with small businesses. I picked all 100 tenants that went in there and was involved with them every step of the way. It was a huge success, and from there I went on to work for a company called Appear Here who describe themselves as "Airbnb for retail".
I stayed there up until last year; I was exhausted from working in London for eight years and decided to take a career break. During that time, Someday Studios was born.
How did Someday Studios start up, and how did you come into contact with Westminster Council?
It came together with a former colleague, Becky Jones. We had worked together previously for four or five years, and we'd always talked about doing our own business together someday. I was on a career break so the timing was really perfect.
Suddenly, this project was published on the Westminster Council website talking about looking for companies to help us shape the future of Oxford Street. Becky and I scrambled together an application in about a week - it was actually my birthday at the time and I was travelling, and she was in Cornwall on the beach in a mobile caravan. We didn’t even have a website so we never ever expected to hear back.
Then, magically, a couple of months later, we got the email from Westminster Council to say that they selected our company. We were thrilled, so excited.
What problems are this initiative aiming to solve?
Oxford Street is one of Europe's most well known high streets, it’s almost two kilometres long and there’s well over 200 shops on it. Over the last couple of years, there's been a couple of problems with vacant units and unfavourable tenants.
There’s lots of amazing stuff happening on Oxford Street right now, with the return of some big retailers like IKEA and HMV, but there are some some spots that need some love.
We want to work with Westminster Council to inject life and vibrancy back into the high street, and the best way to do that is by letting the next generation of innovative entrepreneurs and creatives take the reins.
The other benefit is that, for these small businesses and business owners, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. We're looking at spaces with a market value of millions of pounds a year. To get an opportunity to access this space, rent free, business rates highly discounted, your fit-out covered for you and the guidance of industry professionals along the way as a cherry on top? It's just such an amazing platform.
I assume you’ve received thousands of applications already, how are you going to manage that?
We've received an overwhelming amount of applications. Again, it was just the two of us launching this project alongside Westminster Council, so we'd had no idea that it would be so well received by the press. We've had brands reach out worldwide, people wanting to get involved from Australia, New York, India - it's crazy, and it’s going to be difficult.
It'll take us a couple of weeks to review every single one, but we will read every single one in detail. We know how much time and effort goes into putting something like that together, it's not like a quick ‘tick the box thing’, it's quite a rigorous application. The stakes are so high and it's such a valid prize.
Do you think that an initiative similar to this would be beneficial in Ireland?
Absolutely. Off the back of my LinkedIn post that went viral, I got hundreds of messages from people in Dublin asking about setting up the same project there. It’s a long term plan. I mean, hopefully some of these deals will grow big enough that we can take it to an International level, but I'd obviously love to come back to Dublin.
I'm there all the time - in fact, I’m back again in two weeks for my sister's wedding. It’s a city that's very close to my heart and I know that it needs a lot of work. If Dublin City Council can get behind us and want to learn, we can definitely, definitely help them out in the future.
