Founder@ Interview
With Georgie Davies
“Think about why you are starting a business. Your why is everything and should always be the thing you come back to when making decisions. It is so easy to get caught up in what you think business success or growth looks like but always coming back to your why means you are running that business authentically.” – Georgie Davies
Today we feature Georgie Davies, the founder at Yogipod. We hear their story in their own words, their successes, their challenges and their insights.
Let’s start by getting to know you. Can you please tell us a little bit about you and what you do?
I am both a business founder and a yoga teacher and both of these elements inform the other. My background was in luxury fashion as a fabric buyer but after nearing burnout within that role, I knew I needed to look after myself better and wanted to take that same ethos to others too.
On the surface Yogipod is a hand block printed yoga props and homewares brand but looking a little deeper it is there to inspire building relaxation and calm into the everyday. Because of my own experience letting elements of life take over my aim both through my teaching and through the products I create is to help people tune into how they truly feel.
I feel that businesses in this age need to be there to help their community, not just to sell items to them and that is what I hope to do. When you engage with the business whether by purchasing, signing up to the newsletter or following us on social media I truly hope that it makes you feel better.
I am passionate about businesses walking as lightly as possible on the planet and being transparent about that. Everything at Yogipod is not currently perfect from an environmental perspective but I am honest about that and try to explain to consumers the nuance of sourcing as a small business and where your power lies.
I believe that business has the power to empower our communities and that’s what I hope to do.
A great introduction and start to this interview. Can you please tell us, how did you start, from what age, and what made you decide to change direction and start?
I started Yogipod kind of by accident. I never expected to leave the fashion industry but one event after another led me to needing to take a break before I burnt out at the age of 28. I went travelling for a little while and that gave me a new perspective which can often be hard to see when you are in the thick of it.
I knew I wanted to be more in control of what I was doing and less on the treadmill of constant reinvention that the fashion industry inspires. I had begun to become disillusioned by the amount of product we were creating and how unsustainable that was both as a industry but also for the team constantly creating.
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I had already qualified as a yoga teacher, without the idea of becoming a teacher, but upon my return from travelling I decided to give teaching a go. Earning a full time living from yoga teaching is incredible hard and demanding on the body and I knew that I wanted to still be creative. So inspired by falling in love with hand crafted products again on my travels I decided to pull together my love of textiles and yoga.
I had always been quite disappointed by how plain and utilitarian yoga props were and so decided to change that by creating props that looked like they could be homewares and creating a homewares line around them. This wasn’t just about them being beautiful though, I knew they needed to be functional and supportive too.
Working with a family run block printing business I trialled importing hand printed fabric and making the props myself here in June 2018. Everyone loved them and I’ve been doing just that ever since. By importing the printed fabric rather than finished goods, I have control to make what is actually selling therefore minimising deadstock.
This flexibility is one of the elements that helps the business to survive and is also an element to us running sustainably. I love the balance of being a yoga teacher, a maker, a business founder and all the other elements that come in to running a small business, even though some days are tougher than others.
Thank you for that insight. So can you tell us…What does your business do and where is your company based?
Yogipod is a hand printed yoga and homewares business. The range consists of block printed yoga props and homewares, hand printed in Jaipur and a range of tees and vests screen printed in Manchester.
The business is based in the South East of England from a variety of locations depending on whether I am teaching yoga, sewing up products or doing all the other stuff around running a small business.
What’s the story behind your success? What led to your aha moment? how did you get to where you are now?
I think knowing what my community is after is a huge part of the success, I am in the community of yoga practitioners all the time being a yoga teacher so I understand how people connect to their practice and their bodies.
This may seem unimportant to running a product business but when that product is so connected to your wellbeing knowing how people are feeling means I know how to support them through social media, blogs on the website and ultimately the products I create.
For me the aha moment was after launch in June 2018 when fellow yoga teachers were recommending my products to their students. I have a lovely community of yoga teacher supporters around the business which not only leads to sales but also gives me so much confidence in what I am creating.
I think surrounding yourself with peers when you are self employed is not talked about enough when figuring out how to succeed. When you work for another business you automatically have peers in other colleagues but that doesn’t happen when you are alone at the kitchen table. Having a few trusted peers in the same or an adjacent field not only gives you some cheerleaders but really helps boost your morale when you’re having an off day.
When it comes to the business being where it is now it has been about being flexible. By having two income streams, that are related but not the same, that gives me the flexibility of earning when maybe sales are slow or classes are quiet. I truly believe in having a niche for your business but having one that can support a couple of different ways of earning money I think is important, especially when we look at what has happened in the last couple of years.
The pandemic lockdowns were actually really good for business as there was the boom in practicing yoga at home, doing home improvements and there being new disposable income. Being small meant I could react to this quickly but it also means that now that sales are quieter I can up my yoga teaching income to cover that quieter period.
It is not easy always juggling the two but one does give peace of mind to the other.
Thank you for sharing that. What’s been your life’s biggest lesson so far?
The biggest lesson I’ve learnt is to look after myself. Ironically working in the wellness sphere it is really easy to forget to look after yourself. If I can say one thing to fellow founders it is to schedule some time into your week to do what feels good for you and what helps you to unwind.
So many of us start our own businesses because we are fed up with the corporate world but then end up perpetuating the same problems ourselves. Use that agency you’ve granted yourself and actually craft what you want your working week to look like.
When it comes to challenges within growing the actual business one of the largest was trying to move fabric and goods out of India during the pandemic. This was understandably a nightmare and despite giving myself plenty of time to receive goods I ended selling out of pretty much everything.
Obviously this wasn’t deal, especially when demand was high, but I used it as an opportunity to educate my community on how the products were made and the time that takes creating more connection between the community and the making process.
Although I definitely lost sales it helped me begin to build that transparent dialogue with my customers which I think they really appreciate.
That it is ok to just start. Nothing will ever be perfect so you might as well launch now and learn on the go.
If you were to go back in time, what piece of advice would you give to your younger self?
Do what you love but also don’t be afraid to step away from what you love if it is no longer serving you. My advice to my younger self would be to learn what everyone else in a business does. Chat to marketing, have a coffee with accounts, understand what logistics do as that knowledge, even small will pay dividends.
I was lucky when I decided to start a business that I had previously worked in small teams where I saw the whole arc of a product business but also I come from a family of self employed parents. When it came to starting a business I already had an idea of how to run one from those experiences.
We’re nearly halfway through our interview so it’s a great time to ask how does your business run. What three tools make your business run better?
Adobe Creative Suite without a doubt.
Photoshop for photo editing, In-Design for linesheets etc and Illustrator any technical specs or illustrations Snapseed for editing photos on the go on my phone.
Something I truly use everyday for social media posts Excel, what can I say I love a spreadsheet and it’s in spreadsheets that I organise my creative mind so that I know what is going on, what I have to do and what I have previously done.
What do you know now that you wished you had known before?
That it is ok to just start. Nothing will ever be perfect so you might as well launch now and learn on the go.
What has been your greatest or proudest achievement or moment?
So many it’s hard to pick one, so I’m going to be cheeky and go with two.
Every time I see somebody using something I created to help them relax, whether in person or online I get the most amazing buzz. From a true business achievement point of view running a week long pop up in John Lewis at the beginning of 2022 was quite a pinch me moment.
What future life goals do you want to achieve and why?
To create a life where I am happy. I have no huge financial aims for the business for me it is more about supporting my community, engaging with other small businesses and creating a life where I love what I do both in and out of the business. Life is too short to be focused entirely on the financial and for me it is more about the quality of my existence.
To finish our inspire questions…”We believe that sharing inspiring words can inspire others.” If there was one positive thing you would say to someone to inspire and empower them what would it be and why?
Think about why you are starting a business. Your why is everything and should always be the thing you come back to when making decisions. It is so easy to get caught up in what you think business success or growth looks like but always coming back to your why means you are running that business authentically.
“Thank you it has been great learning more about your founder story and Yogipod”
To learn more about Yogipod Visit www.yogipod.co.uk
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