The credit crunch has had a profound effect on the way we watch our pennies; the age of austerity has slashed disposable incomes in homes and businesses across the UK.
It’s not all bad news though; this increased focus on saving money has become an opportunity for some entrepreneurs. Founded in 2007, Make It Cheaper helps businesses to get the best deals for their utilities, telecoms, insurance and merchant services.
The company has had super-fast growth, making the Sunday Times Fast Track list two years in a row.
I caught up with managing director Chris Cole.
So Chris, tell me a bit more about the premise of Make It Cheaper
We are on a mission to save SMEs £1bn by 2018, by helping reduce costs on their services, utilities, insurance and telecoms. We’re the largest introducer of new business to the big six energy firms and we guarantee to save business at least £1,000 when they come to us.
We have been small business owners ourselves and understand how hard you have to work to drive the top line. So many hidden costs on the bottom line can slow you down, especially when you don’t have time to focus on these things.
You joined Make It Cheaper as MD after your friend Jonathan Elliot founded it – how did that work?
I joined Make It Cheaper as a non executive, having floated my previous company Hydrogen Group. I really liked the culture and the customer proposition so I decided to make an investment and work with Jonathan [co-MD] full-time.
When we started out there were increasing energy prices, growth in online shopping, a rise in comparison sites and an economic climate which encouraged people to focus on their costs. We’ve achieved 50% year-on-year profit since we formed, which as been great.
You achieved amazing growth almost straight away, how did you cope?
At my previous company I formed a recipe around how to grow. I believe a business needs to have strong vision and a mission. You need to understand where you make the difference for the customer and be able to articulate this. Luckily for us, saving people money is a goal you can really get behind.
In-house, we made sure that we hired great people and fostered an encouraging and positive culture. We’ve been voted one of the Sunday Times’ Best Places To Work – it’s down to setting clear goals and giving people accountability for what they achieve and rewarding them when they do well.
If I was offering advice, I’d say don’t be afraid to look for help externally, to non-execs and other advisors, and learn from their successes and mistakes rather than going through them yourself.
Do you think your business will still be relevant when the economy recovers?
I think that the folks who have grown businesses and survived are not just temporarily cost conscious. Also the economic forecast may be improving but it’s not brilliant – our challenge is to make sure we are relevant to our customers throughout the lifetime of their companies.
How does your revenue model work?
We receive a commission from a supplier when we introduce them to a new customer. It’s really important that we are impartial; our saving experts don’t get different commission or rewards by choosing a particular supplier. This fee model means we can offer the service free to our clients, the businesses.
How has the business changed since you launched in 2007?
The size and scale has obviously altered. Internally, we have professionalized and become more rigorous about what we do. We’ve tried to get clear on systems and processes – there are often a hundred ways of doing the same thing, we keep working hard to simplify the way we do things internally, it makes it easier to scale when you operate that way.
I understand you acquired UK Power in 2012, what encouraged that decision?
It was a great source of lead flow to the business and as they were advising people on saving money on their home utilities, it was a good strategic move. It was a long-established business with a good Google ranking. We had also been doing a lot of fulfillment with them before so it made sense.
So what is next for Make It Cheaper?
We want to continue to grow in the UK and Australia. We launched in Australia in 2009 with the same model. It has grown equally as fast out there and we now have 130 people working there. We’re also eying up other potential international locations.
Other than that we are looking into what further products we can offer our customers to save them more money.
That’s what it’s all about Chris…