Start-up Success: Interview with Massage Warehouse

 

We’ve interviewed Acorn IT customers in some of the UK’s Top 50 most populated cities to explore how location has influenced their business success. From this we’ve produced a series of four blog posts that aim to help educate new or future SME owners on how location can factor into their business.

Greg Coughlan from massage equipment and supplies specialists Massage Warehouse, based in Cardiff, tells us how significant it can be to locate your business near a skilled workforce. Getting the right staff at the right price can be the difference between success and failure. He also highlights the significance of good communications and delivery networks for online sales.

Tell us about your business in a sentence

We are an online retailer for massage equipment and supplies, supporting massage therapists and clinics throughout the UK and Europe.

In which city is your business located?

Cardiff.

How has your location helped with your business success?

For an online retail business, getting products to the customer fast and efficiently is vital. Locating ourselves strategically near a courier hub and major road network allows us to get essential products to our customers next working day, and allows us to send orders later in the day.

Did your location affect your ability to find talent and recruit employees?

Yes. We positioned ourselves in an area where are a lot of call centres are based. We therefore had a large pool of highly trained customer services specialists to choose from. A lot of none core personal can now also work from home or work independent of location occasionally. Vonage helped us greatly with this via their VOIP services and we were early adopters to the technology nearly ten years ago.

To what extent has your location affected the competition your business faces today?

Location has played a major role. Online shoppers want their purchases yesterday. We can provide faster delivery than our competition with later cut off times.

Has your location provided more exposure to your ideal customer/clients?

Yes, through our ability to serve them better via fast delivery and meet the needs of a population used to doing most of their shopping online.

What factors should a potential new business owner consider when looking at a location?

Ask yourself what are your core USP’s. Once you have them listed, determine how a certain location will increase the effectiveness of the USP to better serve your customers and ultimately your business success. As mentioned above, for an online retail business, access to an efficient courier, road network and customer support personnel can be a huge benefit.