I was still keeping the old business ticking over and we also started renting out the Portugal house so had plenty to keep me busy but it wasn’t enough, my husband kept telling me about how ‘on line’ was the way of the future and perhaps I should get in to something to do with that, at one point I was training to help him with his business and this involved me learning about internet marketing etc.

From the time Max was a baby I had made regular trips to Portugal and would buy most of his clothes and shoes there. As he was in Nursery and we were spending less time in Portugal I was forced to buy shoes for him here in the UK.

Max's chukka boot!

I was amazed at the lack of classic boys shoes and if and when I could find them they were so expensive, Max has feet that grow quickly so I was reluctant to pay the prices they wanted, I would try to hold out for a trip to Portugal and only bought the shoes I absolutely had to in the UK like school shoes, I wanted to have a choice of shoes for him to wear depending on the occasion and I definitely didn’t want him in trainers unless he was playing some sort of sport. Anyway, we were going to the states for Christmas 2009 and I was going to buy him some shoes there as we hadn’t been to Portugal and the ones he had were on their last legs, I was exasperated to find the same problem there! We arrived back in the Uk and I desperately went out to look for some decent shoes for him and that was the start of my idea for cool boys shoes. I walked in to a well known high street shop that sells good quality shoes and the choice of casual shoes for boys was pitiful and what they had was expensive, when I asked if they had more choice they directed me to the rows and rows of trainers! I don’t want trainers!! I asked why and they couldn’t really explain other than that they thought they wouldn’t sell as most people want trainers.

I started to research  by asking people I knew what they felt and they seemed to agree with me so I then started to look in to the world of children’s shoes!

It was a great help to be able to speak to an old friend of my husbands that had been in the shoe industry for 25+ years, he agreed with me that there was a gap in the market for what I was looking to do and he gave me loads of useful information including advice to go to a trade fair for mid to high end shoes in Italy that he was attending . The fayre was only a few weeks away but I decided to jump in and book my flights and Hotel room and do some research in the mean time. Just before the fair I got an e mail from my husbands friend saying he couldn’t make it! HELP! I don’t speak Italian, I don’t really know what I’m looking for, how do I get from the airport to the hotel?, to the fair? Ah well, I’ll just have to get on with it.

I arrived in Italy and couldn’t believe that nobody spoke English! Nothing was written in English! Anyway, I got on a bus that I thought was going to the fair and 20 minutes in to the journey it stopped and people started getting off but not everyone??!! Panic! Then I spotted somebody carrying something with the name of the fair on it and they were headed for the door so I jumped up and got off and followed them. Luckily for me, it was going to the right place, phew.

I trawled round this absolutely massive trade fair asking questions, taking notes etc. , etc., and then came back to the Uk after a couple of days with loads of information and a lot more research to do.

I finally chose to get samples from the few suppliers that I thought had what I wanted and then organised an evening at my home and one day at my sister in laws home where I asked other moms to come and check out the samples and fill out a questionnaire to give me their honest feedback. It was really useful.

Unfortunately I had to ditch one of my suppliers and find another one, which I did after a month or so which unfortunately delayed things a bit but better to get it right. There was a lot of negotiating to be done too, as I was a new business with no history to supply the manufacturers with it was quite tricky to get them to take me seriously! One potential supplier that had shoes I liked didn’t want to supply me without me paying everything up front but I was reluctant to do that because he was quite a small manufacturer and I had no way of knowing he could come up with the goods to the standard I wanted. I offered to pay some up front and the rest once I had checked the order was correct but he wouldn’t agree so I had to loose him too! I was concerned that I was taking longer than I had planned but the thought of making the right first impression and not dissapointing people kept me from rushing things.