How to Build a Sustainable Framework to Shortcut Your Way to Success with Sara Simmonds

Good morning and welcome to Essential Ingredients, I'm Justine Reichman, your host. Today, we have here Sarah Simmonds, we're really excited to introduce you.

Hi, Justine. Sending you love from London?

Show us, show us, choose love?

Choose love, yes, you'll learn more about this T-shirt later. When we're talking about conscious fashion, there's a story behind it.

I love that, can't wait. So for our listeners here, for those of you that don't know, I met Sarah on Instagram. Believe it or not, with everything going on in COVID, so many of us are connecting through a variety of channels. Sarah was having a chat on Instagram, I think live with one of the people we had on one of our talks, one of our Table Talks who has a company called YES. She is really involved, reminding me her name, Oh, my God, I'm having a brain freeze at this moment, [inaudible]. She started her career in food and then went to fashion. And it seemed like a natural fit to have a conversation with you. It was a natural fit to have a conversation with us, but I found us through her because she had posted that she was connecting with you. I was super excited to connect with you because you're super conscious about building mindful companies and having an impact. Your thoughtfulness around sustainability and building sustainable companies is really what resonated with me. I'd love for you to just tell our listeners a little bit about yourself, if you don't mind, and share your story.

Sure. Of course, and then pleasure. So my background is in the fashion industry. I worked as one of the world's top fashion buyers for one of the world's top stores for many years. That store is a department store in London called Harvey Nichols, and that's where I began my career. After growing up, I was the daughter of a textile entrepreneur. My father had a textile company in Yorkshire, which was where all the manufacturing was done. I really grew up understanding, loving the power and the impact, the positive impact that what we make can do for the world so I pursued my dream to be a fashion buyer. I worked in this department store, Harvey Nichols for seven years, I was going all over the world visiting the world's top showrooms to buy the world's top luxury brands, the world's top consumers, and I love that job. I was fulfilling my dream until over the last year, or two this is about 15 years ago, I really began to notice the very beginnings of a change in how we consume as the industries and the cycle of what we buy was getting faster and faster, and that was in the luxury industry, the luxury fashion industry. I began to see, ask myself the question, what's the difference between luxury and fast fashion? I was seeing more and more products, I was seeing people marketing those products, the same thing, the same time and time again, each season even though it was practically the same product. I was seeing countries of manufacturing change and the quality of the clothes go down. This really did not connect well to my heart, and I knew that I wanted to make a difference in fashion, and in impact, and in how we buy and what we buy. So at that time, I had built a framework for building award winning fashion by strategies, I call it my hero product framework. So I said, Okay, you know what? I don't know how to be an entrepreneur, but I do know how to build award winning product strategies so I'm going to take that framework and I'm going to jump out of Harvey Nichols and my career and become an impact entrepreneur.

I love that. And now you're not just building a hero product framework, you are an entrepreneur, even though you said you didn't know how to be one.

Absolutely, yes. 15 years later, I've been an award winning entrepreneur and built multiple successful impact businesses.

Can you share a story about one of the successful stories that you've had with one of your clients? You don't have to necessarily share a brand or a name, but maybe the impact it's had for them.

Yes. Well, I've done two things, I have built award winning conscious brands, and I coach other people how to build award winning conscious brands and businesses. So with my own businesses, the success and the impact that they've had, because of having frameworks to follow, I was able to shortcut building really, like pioneering rounds in a fast amount of time. So when you're making something that's really innovative in the food industry, in the fashion industry, it's really important to use a framework for product success in order to shortcut how you can actually succeed. So I did that by making a luxury sustainable jeans brand, which was called Chakra. And because of the frameworks, I got that into the world's best stores in less than 12 months.

Wow. Can you walk us through that a little bit? What are these? What's the framework look like? Can you share with us a little bit about the framework, and how it shortcuts it for you? What would it look like without that framework? And what does it look like with that framework?

Sure. So basically, right now guys is the most incredible time to make innovation in everything that we are making in the world because customers want something different. But the framework stands by that, when you're making something different, you also have to follow a pattern where everything is the same if you take people on a familiar journey with that new innovation. I wanted to make a brand new pair of jeans in the sense of, made in a completely new, organic, sustainable and handcrafted way, an item that was beginning to end sustainable. So the frameworks helped me because you first have to, when you're building any successful business, you have to look at what's unique about you and you're really, I call it your unique power. So a pair of jeans and innovation, how can I make a pair of jeans unique? I asked myself, when you actually, I wanted to make something sustainable. And then by understanding that, you focus on what's most unique about that item. I then looked at the roadmap of how something is made from the ground up and I built a completely unique sustainable manufacturing method. Then the second part of the roadmap and the framework is that you need to be where the market is. So if you're innovating a brand new food product or a brand new fashion product, you need to make it in some way familiar to your clients into the world so that you can build success around that. I took a unique sustainable manufacturing method and then I put it into a classic item, a pair of jeans with an amazing fit, and an amazing styling, and amazing branding. So it was something totally new and different in a product that people would know. Then the next part of the framework is that you have to really look at your story. I always coach people that you have to pull out a narrative that's something that's very, like one sentence and one word that everybody can identify with you and then build a story on that one thing that builds you, not 10 things, not five things, one hero part of your brand story.

Can you share with us what that one thing would have been maybe with regards to these jeans?

Yes, they are handmade. So the whole story behind the jeans was building a story that it's about people, and it's about handmade, and it's about all the hands that go into the creation of that item.

I love that. So first of all, and people can really get into that. I can visualize the people making them.

Absolutely. And that's the thing, the visualization because I shared the words with you, handmade, you can already imagine the story behind that. That's the power of, when you've really gone through the process to understand what your brand is in the heart of its DNA.

Yeah. And it sounds really quite special, it sounds elevated, it sounds like it was made for me.

Yes.

Not in a factory, which to me is special and something I would prefer.

Yes.

Wonderful, I love that. Can we just take this back for a minute to how this has impacted you on a personal level, and being able to build your coaching business?

Yeah. I think we can even digress a little bit to how this has impacted me on a personal level. Because the thing about my framework is, it's all about unlocking my hero product framework. The first step is all about unlocking what's unique about you. And then what is your purpose? What's your mission? And what's your real brand story? So what I found, that three parts of the process. Now, what I found in my own actual life was I started to really question myself, what's unique about me? What's my real purpose? What's my real brand story? And this led me to, I call it unlock your real power. Because once you understand what's unique about you as a founder, as well as your brand, and then what's your real purpose, and what's your real brand story, you can come to the world from a totally different place, your true sense of authenticity shines through when you've aligned those three things, which actually then can transform your whole life. Because we've all lived unconsciously, and have been living unconsciously, where society and the messages that we have been receiving from all different directions is to be the same, aspire to the same things, live in the same way. When we actually follow our hearts and we go through the process to unlock what's unique about ourselves, then we can start living our true selves. For me, the impact that had was like 360, it changed my life in every way. Miserable I think gave me the confidence and the comfort to be my real self. That meant almost shedding unhealthy friendships, old friendships, limiting beliefs that hold you back, shedding, trying to be anything other than you are and actually really having the clarity on who I actually was. So when you have that, Justine, how you operate every day, you operate with a much deeper sense of wholeness, purpose and confidence, which you know as they say, life is in the present moment, we only have this moment together. When you're totally aligned to who you really are, you can be so much more present. And then all sorts of magical, new, amazing opportunities open up to you. So that's how this process transformed my life.

Wow, that's amazing. Thank you for sharing that, it really resonates with me because I also feel that when I am doing what I love, when I do what I am passionate about, it's easier, I don't mean easier, like less work. I mean, it's the work, it just doesn't bug me down, I'm excited about the work. There's a different sense of achievement, it doesn't feel like I don't want to do it, I'm excited to do it, I can't wait to accomplish it, I'm always trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together, I want to have an impact and I want to figure it all out together. This really resonates for me because, and I always say, I support purpose driven businesses and I'm a purpose driven business because I'm passionate about making healthy food more accessible. I'm passionate about connecting the right people. And one of the reasons that we're having this conversation is because I think that you're such a great asset for so many of our founders, founders looking to build their businesses, startups looking to figure out, maybe they have an idea but they're not sure how to get to the next level. And NextGenChef puts together a robust pool of resources. I think having you as part of that resources is such a luxury for them, it's such a win for them because it's going to give them that great access to tap into themselves in a unique way not just figuring out what am I good at doing? How do I get a paycheck every month? How do I pay my bills? Maybe how do I pay my bills but also how do I be true to myself? Love what I do, wake up every day, excited about it, have an impact on the world.

I love to share, you ask me how the impact coaching program, how it helps founders and some of the examples of that from current clients. The biggest thing I think that holds people back is when you're looking to launch a new business, or even you've launched a business and then you want to take it to the next level, it's really about having clarity on that. Number one, part of you that is most unique and then having a roadmap to follow to actually build your success. So that's what my system really teaches you, and that's the biggest benefit that people experience is having that absolute clarity on what to focus about themselves that's most unique, how to build that brand, that positioning statement, their whole business around that unique quality.

Wonderful. Thank you Sarah for just taking a moment here. I really appreciate you sharing that because one of the things that I wanted to share from that was, a lot of times I think people, when they're trying to figure out what they want to do and they have this vision, they have all these different ideas and they don't know how to funnel it down to figure out what that revenue trigger is, or where to focus, and it sounds like, and correct me if I'm wrong, but this framework that you're creating, or that you've created will allow them to figure out how to dial into their vision and really make it a scalable, functioning business that will allow them to tap into their purpose driven idea and build a scalable company. Because I go back to that first conversation where you and I had a conversation, the first talk that we had, and we had a conversation about how money was really important to it as well, and how people need to make money, I really love when you were talking and I'm gonna botch this all up. But when you said you had one client and she came to you and said all these reasons why she wasn't going to make the financial results that she had put on her calendar for that week. And you're like, no, I'm sorry, no, you need to make that. I love that because it brings people back to that point where they have to realize that they have their vision, and where from that shutter point they are going to focus to be able to continue and figure out where that revenue trigger is going to come, and how they're going to be able to build it. I think that's what you're giving them, which is, as a founder myself, I get that that's so important because we have all these ideas, and I'm excited about them all the time.

But it's about money at the end of the day. Because you want to build a sustainable business, you want to enjoy what you're doing and you want to grow from it, you want to see all your hard work paying off. The way to actually make that money is to set goals and have financial goals, and then build an actual roadmap that goes, How am I gonna sell? Who am I going to sell to? What's my process for doing that? What's my timeframe for doing that? So through the process that we coach around, it actually teaches you that as well. So you set goals for two months, six months, 12 months, three years, so you really got a roadmap of where you're going. And then it's like, okay, brainstorm, how are you going to sell next week, and who you're going to sell to? Who are your dream clients, and how you're going to go out and make connections with them? Which is where the real brand story comes into it. So basically you're learning like two roads through this coaching process at the same time. You're learning who you are as a brand, what makes you unique? I guess all the touchy feely stuff, but then with the hard nosed business frameworks underneath. What's your financial goals? What's your plan? How you're going to make those direct connections and those digital connections that are going to make your money? Because I see so many founders saying, I'm doing it for the love of doing this. I'm like, no, you've got to do it for the money that you really want to make out of it. And that's where the real exciting part for me, about seeing the success of my clients grow and be profitable through this process.

I think it's really, what you're doing is a unique offering because so many coaches are just doing what you love and it's more about the touchy feely. When you deal with the financial people, it's more about, this is viable and scalable. But there's nobody that I know that's really connecting the dots on phones. And I love that because it allows me to honor what I'm really passionate about, but really be thoughtful about, okay, this really does need to be, I do need to scale this. How do I take my vision and make this viable business? I want both.

I'm excited because, I'm sorry to jump in, I see founders, they're so creative. And yet when it comes to analysis, like finance, because I've been there myself that's why I'm able to teach this, you become very overwhelmed and you go, I don't understand social media, I don't understand how to digital, I don't understand marketing, or I don't understand, like, I don't know what my numbers are. So many founders I say, how much money did you make last year? What were your key best selling product lines? And then I'll go and analyze your business and they have not looked at their numbers, and then they are shying away from the analytics of their social media. So what I teach is to actually dive into that and take the fear out of it. Because when you look inside your business and you actually analyze what's happened with your numbers rather than kind of outsourcing it and going, Oh, my accountants dealing with it. Well, here's the news, your accountant is never actually going to tell you what is actually going on in your business, you've got to take ownership of that and learn it yourself. And the same with marketing, you can outsource it to a social media person, or a company, etc. But again, if you outsource it, you don't learn the skill yourself so you can't really grasp it and own it. And this is the biggest lesson I've learned in business, to succeed is to really get expertise, invest in expertise. When I started to invest in outside experts, my success just went through the roof. So when you actually invest into the expertise, when you learn it yourself, then that's where you really begin to succeed at a new much deeper level because you've got the full awareness of your business and you're fully empowered on how to build your success as you've learned it.

Yeah, I would agree. Just to clarify for our listeners, you're not necessarily saying that they need to do all the social media and everything, they just need to take an active role in it. They need to, not just hand it off, if you're going to have somebody do it, and correct me if I'm wrong, but have them circle back with you and tell you what the findings are, what's working, what's not, what are you finding so that you guys can, am I correct? Is this what you're saying? Or are you saying that we can all do it ourselves? I do go out and do my own social media.

Yeah, I really would say do it yourself.

Allright.

Example, I'm launching a new website, this has been a really scary thing for me, as outside of my comfort zone, I haven't understood it. I didn't know what to do. Now, what I did is I really wanted to because, I know now that your success happens when you understand the thing yourself. I was like, alright, I'm going to co create that website with a developer at the same time. And this, again, has been an awesome experience because it enabled me to do it really, I wouldn't dream of trying to do it myself. But doing it with someone, it means that I'm learning and they're teaching me all about how the back end of the world works so that if I need to, I can make those changes. Even more importantly, when you've got your team there, you can actually tell the team and show them how to do it. So if you outsource it, you can never lead your team in the way that you want to lead them, because you don't fully understand your own systems. When you actually learn the system yourself and you've seen how this post reacts with people, how they connect with those words that you say, etcetera, etcetera in your business, then you can lead your team on what to do.

I think that that's super helpful because when I was talking about social media, I co-created with my people as well. I often do a lot of it myself because I'm out there and I wanted to have my voice. But there are times and places where we need to promote events, talks and stuff, and you need to have the support so I can go off and do something else. But it is very much co-created like you said. Because if I don't know how to do it, I can't go in there and do things when the ball drops, so to speak. But before this, I ran a gaming company and there was a whole lot of technology, coding and all sorts of things I knew nothing about. And frankly, I did not want to learn how to code. That was not anything I wanted any part of. But we did have a hit by the bus plan and we did have a wiki to learn how to turn on and off the systems, to reboot, like a little key. The reason I'm bringing this up is not because it directly relates, but because there are things that we're not ever going to be able to do, there are things. But there are tools and ways for us to be able to participate in them so that we're not giving over the keys to the kingdom. Are there any recommendations you might have for things like that so that we're making sure that we're locked in, we're safe there and that we're participatory? Do you know what I mean? For example, when I ran this gaming company, I did not know how to code, right? You don't know how to do a website, but you're co creating the website. There's things in technology that we don't miss--

I think in your business, when you understand each element of how the different parts of the business operates from the top line, that's when you get control over your business and that's when you're really empowered, both to lead your business, to organize your business and to plan your business. So knowing how our website operates, you don't need to understand the code or how to build the thing, but just how it operates so then you can teach your team. Okay, please can you go in and customize that page, tweak that, do that. They understand it. Finance, knowing what's driving the success of your business, what actually is making you money? This is a big one because what I see people doing over and over again is over developing products. This is a big part of what I teach, it's not over developing the products, it's simplifying the products that you have. People tend to develop 30 products, or 100 products, or even 10, and I say. go and look at what's making you money. What is making you money? Analyze it. To see what's making the most profit. It's always one, two, or maybe three hero products, never more. So what I teach is how you build that hero product strategy into, a direct to consumer strategy that's actually going to, again, build your success.

I love that, and I'm super excited because I know that you're going to come on for a Lunch and Learn soon to NextGenChef and be able to give everybody a little bit more of an idea of what it is to go through that process with you, and learn a little bit about that in a short form as well so that they can start to build their businesses and understand what building a hero product is. I'm just curious, as you're doing this for yourself and for these other businesses, you've been doing this now for 15 years for yourself, what are you looking at now as you are building your business? What are some of the things that you're looking to grow and expand on to continue to grow your business?

I'm really, really, really excited about the current, the world and the positives that have arisen from COVID. It has really speeded up the onset of digital, our digital world. I think that that brings huge possibilities for businesses to scale in all sorts of ways much faster than they ever knew before. So that's what I'm applying to my business personally, because as well as, when I'm teaching and sharing my knowledge, I'm learning and learning more so that I can share more all the time. I think that this is what's most exciting right now because in terms of going digital and going direct to the consumer, there's methodologies, again, that I share and coach and teach, but there's proven ways to do things. So the opportunity is finding roadmaps and learning from experts, the proven ways of doing things so that you actually can shortcut your own time to success.

Right. And you shared some of those actually. You shared part of the roadmaps with people so that they can get excited about that. You're talking about the impact of COVID, how that has shaped the environment for digital? How has it shaped what you're building and your ability to grow in terms of your planning for the future? Have you changed anything that you're offering now? Has it changed your platform and your products, or your connection, your way to connect with people?

I think that having COVID gives us the ability to focus. So how it's changed me is, Tedx, my focus, because there's no time being lost in terms of going to a meeting, sitting down in front of that person, not necessarily knowing if they're the right fit in terms of a business relationship. Being digital means that we can just schedule in those meetings, research the people that we want to research and connect with, and then really speed up that process. And then going social, which is something that I've been doing with my businesses for years, again, this is something that has such huge opportunities to learn because people want social and they want it in a particular way, which is all about being real. So all of these skill sets, the digital, the social, being real, building power networks, which is what I call it, and teaching, it gives you these huge opportunities and foundations to grow quickly. I'm applying everything I teach, I'm also applying to my own businesses.

You'd say that this has been a positive thing in terms of business for you, you're really lucky to sort of sit down, hone in on what you're doing, not giving you any time to be distracted or procrastinate, you're really focused and you're able to work one on one with people.

I believe that in turning everything in life into a positive. So suddenly, when do we get the time to actually sit down and do things properly? COVID has given us that time to sit down, understand things properly and make the proper roadmaps for success that we want.

Wonderful. So right now we're talking about we're going to be having you and join us at a Lunch and Learn coming up in the next couple months for NextGenChef, and in the meantime, we will be launching this podcast in the next few weeks. And for our listeners, I'd love to just have them hear from you, where they might be able to find you? And if there's a special offer that you want to make to them.

Absolutely. You can find me on Instagram at sarasimmondslondon. And also my new website, which I've just finished, will be launching in the next couple of weeks. I'm sure by the time that this podcast is live, then my website will have launched which is sarasimmonds.com. In terms of the offer, yes, of course, I would love to offer your listeners a very special price I'm offering for the coaching program that we do. That coaching program is an eight week coaching program, and it's all done live on Zoom in individuals and small groups. So when you come to the Lunch and Learn, then I'm going to reveal that special offer that is specifically for you guys.

Wonderful. If you'd like this podcast, subscribe to the Essential Ingredients channel, we will have lots of other talks like this. You can find out more about NextGenChef at the NextGenChef website. Sara, we invite you to join us there as well to part of the community and connect with our other members there, you can upload your profile, and picture, and all of our listeners can as well,and they can connect with you one on one there as well. Thank you to our listeners, thank you, Sara, for joining us. We look forward to continuing the conversation that is our Lunch and Learn and having many more conversations to come. Before we leave, would you share with us, please, the impact you hope to have on the future food and sustainability.

Yeah, I think that the future of food and sustainability is all centered around innovation. So it's around innovating products and regenerating how we operate and doing things in new ways. The impact I want to have is to enable and empower people to get there faster with clear, with clarity and with the right roadmaps to enable their success. So my goal is everybody's success. I've been in the area of sustainability for 15 years, learning all the ways not to do it so that I can empower you on the ways to do it super quickly.

Wonderful, Sara, I'm so excited about this. The next conversation I hope we can have is about building sustainability not just for our business, but for our personal life. Because I believe that if we can have a sustainable personal life, we can also have a sustainable business life, they go hand in hand. I hope we can continue that conversation. Thank you to our listeners. Thank you, Sarah, for joining us.