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“Being oder I’ve larnt that thre aren’t suces and faiures. Yo larn


and moe foward. Te only faiure i i yo don’t larn anything.”


job that involved a lot of travel and din- ners. But Renée was aware that she wanted to do something else. “I knew I wanted to own my own business. I needed to be pas- sionate about it and I wasn’t interested in convention.” It was back in the US at Bread & Circus, an innovative, organic su- permarket in Boston that she had an epiphany. “It was something different. It was a beautiful, clean store with brilliant products and knowledgeable staff and I knew then that that’s what I wanted to do.” Renée didn’t let the small matter of


knowing nothing at all about retail get in the way of her plans but she did rely on her strong background in health and her family tradition of good food appreciation. “Te health interest was always there. It’s why I studied it at university. My mother Lucille was an amazing cook and baker who always cooked from scratch. My fa- ther, Edward, was an engineer and always had a huge vegetable garden which we all helped out on as kids. I knew nothing about retail but I knew I had to do it,” she explains. After a stint working at an or- ganic shop in London to gain necessary ex- perience, Renée launched Planet Organic in November 1995. “I had a lot of negativ- ity from certain places saying ‘don’t follow your dream.’ My attitude was it will either succeed or fail but I have to try.” It’s difficult to imagine now with seven


locations in London, and its imitators a feature of most high streets and towns, but at the time Renée and her business partner had a hard time getting funding for the project as “investors were not on board. Tey couldn’t get their heads around the concept of this new way of retail.” While much of the funding came from friends


“Yo have t take care o yorsel bfoe yo can show up fo anyon else.”


www.focus-info.org


and families, there was one banker who was willing to take the plunge as he re- membered when his institution passed on the opportunity to invest early in the Body Shop. In fact, Renée cites Body Shop founder Anita Roddick as one of her role models because of the way Anita shook up the body care industry. “Anita was doing in body care what I wanted to do in food. I felt horror at the realisation that no one is looking out for my best in- terest. Just because it’s for sale doesn’t mean it’s good for you. I wanted a store where everything fits that ethos.” Te chain of stores bills itself as the one-stop shop for all the right choices and she’s es- pecially proud that during various food scares over the years, Planet Organic have never had to pull any products off the shelves. Planet Organic is now 23 years old and


in the intervening years Renée and her shareholder hired a CEO. Renée stepped aside to relocate to Italy for a while with her family. “I was very tired and stressed. We went for one year and stayed for three” she explains. Tis was after a turbu- lent time when she and her business part- ner went their separate ways after disagreeing on how to take the company forward. A lawsuit ensued and was even- tually settled, leaving the business in Renée’s hands. “I learned lots of lessons with that experience. You don’t know what you’re made of until life throws something difficult at you,” she reflects. And from this vantage point Renée confi- dently states that the hardest lesson she learnt from that experience was to always trust your gut. “Don’t say it’ll be fine if you suspect a red flag. All good relation- ships are based on trust, respect and good communication. Make sure investors re- spect what you’re doing and always talk things through. If you’re unsure and it’s uncomfortable, talk about it. It might not be very British, but do it! Life is about re- lationships.” Now back in the UK, Renée has devel- oped another innovative business, Beluga


Bean, a business and life skills mentoring academy. Where Planet Organic is focused on physical well-being, her new venture is all about what she calls the Seven Spheres of Wellbeing – physical, occupational, eco- nomic, social, intellectual, emotional and spiritual. It grew, organically of course, from the years of experience Renée gained from business, personal development and mentoring. “Beluga Bean is a very mother- ing, nurturing thing to do. My mother was very loving and nurturing. I thought all mothers were like that but I saw friends who didn’t have that,” she explains. Te academy is all about empowering people – it has focussed on women, but now in- cludes men – with the know-how for things we usually don’t learn in school. “Girls are going out into the world without the skills for things like household budget- ing, understanding their taxes, pensions, managing salaries. Girls asked questions about these issues so I thought ‘I could run an academy!’” Te mission of the academy is how to


lead a fulfilled, joyous life. Te biggest les- son Renée says she has learned over the years is that “you are the most important person in your life. You have to take care of yourself before you can show up for any- one else.” And the best lesson? Tat it re- ally isn’t about the destination, getting to some idealised point on the horizon where everything will be different, but about the journey. “If you don’t enjoy what you’re doing, there’s no point. It’s a rollercoaster and you have to enjoy it. Also, being older I’ve learnt that there aren’t success and fail- ures. You learn and move forward. Te only failure is if you don’t learn anything.”


Francine Bosco is the Editor of FOCUS magazine and can be reached at focus.info.editor@gmail.com


FOCUS The Magazine 9


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