From Formation To Launch – The Diary Of A Start Up

While the company formation process isn’t easy and presents many challenges – especially in the current economic climate – more and more people are choosing entrepreneurialism over the security offered by full time employment. But what does it take to get your business idea off the ground?
We asked recent company formation owner, Laura Andrews, to keep a diary on how she started her business from formation to launch. Please find the first instalment below.
Week One – Background
I am Laura Andrews and you join me one year into the company formation process, with three months left to go before I launch my own company – Beautiful Organics Skincare and Cosmetics.
I am sure you are thinking “Gosh that is a ridiculously long formation process!’ This is the result of the fact that I still have a full time job. It was tempting to throw in the towel and concentrate all my time, energy and money into getting the company off the ground, but ultimately, I felt that my business would have a lot greater chance of surviving, if I didn’t rush in and  I took the  time to plan, research and focus on finding potential routes to market.
So who am I? I have been the online brand director of a large corporation in the cosmetics sector for a number of years and I had a baby last year. The defining moment that made me think I wanted to start my own company was when I went back to work after having my son; the demands of juggling a high pressure job with looking after a baby were proving extremely difficult. However, we couldn’t afford for me to stop working entirely and I still felt I had a lot to offer professionally. So decided to develop my own skincare brand and Beautiful Organics was formed.
In order for you to get up to speed on everything that has happened along the way, in this post I want to outline my brand proposition and then over the next couple of weeks give you an insight on how we have managed all the various areas of forming a company;from finance to research and marketing.
Here is our brand statement;
• To make organic skincare accessible to everyone
• To cut through the science and tell our customer what organic skincare can actually achieve.
• To go beyond marketing and PR and establish the brand as a leading authority on organic skincare and cosmetics.
And on a personal note, I wanted to work in something I was passionate about and have a more flexible working life. 
See you next time,
Laura