For as long as I can remember I have always been an innovative, independent and driven person. I have always strived for the best of the best and I always work towards achieving greatness in everything that I put my mind to. I am especially passionate about business and business creation, especially since I opened my first Vehicle Body Repair Centre at the young age of just 23 years old.
Opening Autocolourworx
Throughout my time at Autocolourworx, I always put my all into making it a successful and innovative business which not only resulted in customer satisfaction, but also my own satisfaction as well. However, after two very successful years, I decided to sell my portion of Autocolourworx to my business partner, Jamie. I did this in order to fulfil my dreams of beginning a new venture which didn’t require the increasingly expensive overheads of running a shop-based business.
Finding a cheap and reliable distributor
As a result of my passion and drive for kickboxing as well as training religiously nearly every single night, my new business venture seemed to just fall into place perfectly. At the time, my Dad went on an exciting holiday trip to Thailand, and when he came back, he mentioned to me that various types of boxing equipment were far cheaper in Thailand than over here.
Through learning about Thailand from my Dad, I began thinking about distributors, especially in order to learn how to begin this business venture that I was so keen to succeed at. Using my initiative, I found a distributor in Thailand who was not only cheap, but reliable too. This distributor would send me all of the top brands of kickboxing equipment for me to sell back here in the UK.
Finding an alternative route
Although this avenue of thinking was great at the time, I slowly began to realise that the margins weren’t as good as I first expected them to be. I realised that for this venture to really take off, I would require thousands of pounds of investment in order for it to be a true success.
I needed an alternative route so that I could begin to set up my new business venture. I thought of various ways in which I could produce my own brand that would allow me to completely control the production of my own equipment at all levels.
After getting the factory sorted, I made sure that the quality of my new products was perfectly designed for all of my potential customers. This route was not only more productive than my previous ideas of finding a distributor in Thailand, but it also meant that I could produce high-quality and reliable pieces of equipment that would suit fighters of all levels.
It’s all in the name
After sorting out all the logistics of starting my new business venture, I needed a name that would make my brand not only well-known, but that would also suit the kind of equipment that my business produced.
I sat for hours and hours brain storming different potential names. I thought of moves used in kickboxing, as well as words associated with the field of fighting. After much deliberation, I decided on the term ‘Sidekick’ which is a very famous move in kickboxing, although it is not much used in more modern K1 styles. The term ‘Sidekick’ also had an additional meaning, associated with companionship and teamwork which I thought was the perfect name to brand my new range of quality fighter’s equipment with.
The result
After running for almost a decade, Sidekick is the product of my passion and drive to succeed in everything that I put my mind to. The brand is a result of innovative thinking as well as many years of hard work.
I hope that all of my work in building ‘Sidekick’ as a brand has paid off in not only the quality of my products, but also in my customer satisfaction too.