My business is worth £20m – it only came about because my kids were chucking food about at dinner
A SAVVY mum has revealed that she turned a broken fork into a baby business that’s now worth £20 million.
Mum-of-three Cat Dodd, 43, from Gloucestershire, explained that the idea for her business came about back in 2013, when her daughter Olivia was making a mess at meal time.
When Olivia, who was just a toddler at the time, broke her fork, and food began flying everywhere, Cat came up with an idea – to create her very own cutlery that would make mealtimes easier.
It started with an initial family loan of £2,000, and that’s where Doddl came about.
The company is now a multi-million-pound turnover business, a number one bestseller on Amazon and a brand that ships worldwide.
Cat told Fabulous: “The business came about back in 2013 – I was on holiday in the September with my family, when my kids were toddlers and we were having a messy meal time, with food being flicked around with plastic forks.
“Olivia accidentally broke the handle off of the fork and I watched her use the broken utensil end and she started eating her food much easier.
“I had struggled with meal time with the three of them and that was my lightbulb moment that it would be cutlery and the tools that we give our kids that are the problem, rather than our kids not being capable of using them.
“I started moulding handles that I thought would be more suitable for children – making something much more compact and engineered to a child’s hand, strength and coordination and that was the start of a two year, research developing journey, to find the perfect kids’ cutlery.
“My mum and dad gave me a £2,000 loan to help me get things going in the early days.
“We had a soft launch in 2016 through Kickstarter, a crowdfunding platform. We were trying to manufacture in the UK, but it just wasn’t possible, so we had to set up the manufacturing in China and properly launched to market in 2017.”
Cat explained that after giving birth to her children, she was a stay-at-home mum, and her twins, Megan and Morgan, were two-years-old and her eldest daughter, Olivia was three, when the business came about.
She revealed that she had looked at going back to her job, in waste and recycling, but the childcare costs were far too high. As a result, she took a risk and launched Doddl.
She added: “I’d always wanted to run my own business, I’d felt like that for a long time.
“I had looked at going back to work, but the childcare costs were astronomical so it didn’t make it financially viable. I would be paying more in childcare costs than I would have been earning.
“It gave me the window of opportunity to see whether I could get the business off the ground.
“My husband was a bit concerned when I said about starting the business. I wasn’t necessarily in the best place – I had three young children and suffered with postnatal depression and chronic fatigue syndrome and mentally wasn’t in the best place.
“But I pushed that it would be a bit of salvation for me, as I needed something else other than nappy changing, feeding and crying, to occupy my mind.
“I always felt I had the ability to start and run my own business. I’m good with figures, organised, good at turning my hand to different things.
“It was just me running the business in the early days. Soon after I brought my family on board to help me with strategy and things like that.”
We started from scratch and have grown year on year. We are always looking to at least achieve two times growth per year.
When the idea for Doddl came about, Cat explained that she would work any spare moment of the day on the business.
She continued: “It was very tough raising three children predominantly on my own, because my husband, Ed, 48, was out at work for 10 hours a day.
“Having three toddlers was particularly challenging and often I felt outnumbered and out of control.
“I was constantly thinking about work and kids. I wasn’t getting much sleep at the time. I would be sitting there feeding and thinking about what my next step was.
“In the early days, I would juggle the kids and then whenever they were sleeping, early in the morning or late at night, I’d be working on the business.”
The entrepreneur explained that the business has grown gradually, as the company has a significant emphasis on quality testing.
Cat claimed: “The business has always been a slow build and everything I’ve done for the business has been for the long term goal. When I work on products, I make sure they are the best cutlery in the world, which is why I spent such a long time researching and testing.
“Our products are more expensive than standard kids’ cutlery but it’s worth the investment because it’s significantly better than other kids’ cutlery.”
Thanks to Cat’s dedication, the business has now expanded, and she has a business partner, Laura, working alongside her.
She revealed: “My business partner Laura came in in 2017 and we’ve continued to build and expand the team. We’re looking to expand the team quite significantly going forward.
“We’ve got four employed members of staff and then we use a lot of agencies and partners to support our activities.
“We started from scratch and have grown year on year. We are always looking to at least achieve two times growth per year.
“When we started we were focused on the UK but through social media, this has grown worldwide. Someone had ordered our cutlery in Taiwan, and their kid was a mini celebrity there and they had done a post online and the next thing we knew we had all of these orders pinging in from Taiwan.
“That gave us a definite spike in sales. Taiwan has been a good market for us.
“We now ship worldwide – our biggest markets are the UK, Japan, which has seen 300% growth year on year and Taiwan.”
Cat explained that fitness coach Joe Wicks is a fan of Doddl too.
She noted: “Joe Wicks purchased our cutlery and used it during Covid on a social media post. He did a random post about the cutlery and confirmed that it was Doddl and then literally our sales went boom.
“We had sold 10,000 units within a day, which was around £120,000 in sales.”
In terms of a valuation, Doddl values at around £20 million.
Now, Doddl has grown by 150% internationally year on year and there’s been over one million products sold worldwide.
Cat added: “In terms of a valuation, Doddl values at around £20 million.
“Generally the growth has been steady. Building up to Christmas we often see a peak, but it’s very steady throughout the year.”
But despite having a multi-million pound business under her belt, things haven’t always been easy for the busy mum.
Cat opened up: “I am the main carer of my kids and my business partner Laura is also the main carer of her kids, so it’s been a massive challenge to ensure that our kids’ needs are met, whilst running a multi-million pound business.
“It was a lonely place at the start when it was just me, but having Laura on board has been a real rock.”
If you are looking to start your own company, Cat has shared her top advice.
She advised: “Research is really important, don’t cut corners on that.
“Testing, testing, testing, make sure that what you are putting out there is absolutely the best.
“You definitely need to be resilient. It is a constant rollercoaster of highs and lows.
“You’ve got to back your own ability and you need to be able to plan and be organised.”
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