Video

<p>Hear the story of London café-bar and restaurant company GRIND and how founder David Abrahamovitch grew the business.&nbsp;</p>

Since launching in 2005, the Enterprise Nation team has helped thousands of people start and grow their businesses. Led by founder Emma Jones MBE, Enterprise Nation continues to be the most active UK small business community and a leading campaigning voice for small business. Joining Enterprise Nation connects you with resources, community and connections you need to reach your business goals.

Hear the story of London café-bar and restaurant company GRIND and how founder David Abrahamovitch grew the business.

The Start-up Series Extra: The story of GRIND

Hear the story of London café-bar and restaurant company GRIND and how founder David Abrahamovitch grew the business.&nbsp;

I’m a content and communications strategist with a passion for brand storytelling. I also happen to be Enterprise Nation’s content manager – so if there’s anything you’d like to see more of, or you have a story to tell, please do connect!

Content Manager

Rifhat Qureshi: ‘I’m using fashion as a vehicle to support women’

The fashion entrepreneur talks about her residency at the Hello, World shop.

&lt;p&gt;My motto in life and work is 'Meet people, make friends, and help them.'&amp;nbsp;Getting to know people is the best way of finding out what makes them tick in terms of goals, ambitions, dreams, interests and life in general. I help people by listening to what they need, suggesting ideas, sending links, making introductions, adding value, and offering relevant products and services, where appropriate. When friends have a problem, I love to help them fix it.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;My varied portfolio career means I have knowledge, experience and contacts in many fields. I am an expert in book publishing, media, mentoring, writing, editing, marketing, crowdfunding, sponsorship, social enterprise and commercial start-ups.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I'd love to get to know you better, so I can help you get to where you want to be.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Career highlights:&lt;br /&gt;
• Book trade professional since 1990&lt;br /&gt;
• Consultant Producer, YOU'RE BOOKED! (ITV book series)&lt;br /&gt;
• Pioneer, World Book Day UK&lt;br /&gt;
• Research Director, StoryCode (online recommendation engine for fiction, featured on BBC TV’s DRAGONS’ DEN)&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Current roles:&lt;br /&gt;
• Founder, CopyGhosting Publishing Services (editorial, marketing, PR &amp;amp; digital agency)&amp;nbsp;&lt;br /&gt;
• Editor &amp;amp; Development Executive, Insight Film Festival&lt;br /&gt;
• Founder, Jolabokaflod CIC (promoting Icelandic 'Christmas book flood' tradition)&amp;nbsp;&lt;br /&gt;
• Director of Crowdfunding, CrowdPatch CIC: free crowdfunding platform for social enterprise&lt;br /&gt;
• Founder, The Wisdom of Coffee: a network for Meetup gatherings &amp;amp; a community that shares best practice about business, enterprise &amp;amp; alternative finance)&lt;br /&gt;
• Founder, Smart Crowd Productions: integrated arts, media, business &amp;amp; alternative finance production consultancy&lt;br /&gt;
• Director: Corporative Sponsorship, SMGlobal Catwalk, Inc: global fashion events brand&lt;br /&gt;
• Social entrepreneur, 12R Prizes: solving social issues and commercial problems via sponsored cash-prize comptetions&lt;br /&gt;
• Mentor, Founders and Mentors: networking platform, comprising forum, communities and courses for mentors to help pre-launch founders launch start-ups successfully&lt;br /&gt;
• Social entrepreneur, 12Ronnies: hub that provides founders, inventors and creatives a toolkit for launching a startup successfully&lt;br /&gt;
• Co-founder, CrowdMall: virtual shopping centre for ideas that do not yet exist&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Charities:&lt;br /&gt;
• Chairman, Seeds Creatives (charity): runs the ‘Artist in Your Own Residence’ collaborative network mentoring scheme for creatives in all disciplines&lt;br /&gt;
• Director, Arts Centre Group (charity): membership organisation for arts &amp;amp; media professionals&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Committees:&lt;br /&gt;
• All-Party Parliamentary Committee for Crowdfunding (chair: Barry Sheerman MP): meets quarterly at the House of Commons&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Author:&lt;br /&gt;
• Six published books&lt;br /&gt;
• Two books in progress&lt;/p&gt;

Serial entrepreneur

Pre-launch founders, inventors & creatives

Signposting for advice, tools and resources for members wanting to start turning an idea into a business.

&lt;p&gt;Hey there!&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I am a fashion business strategy consultant, coach and mentor. I help entrepreneurs looking to change career and enter the fashion industry to develop their idea into a solid product or service.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I also assist and work with&amp;nbsp;fashion entrepreneurs who already have a business but feel like something is missing, that the brand/business&amp;nbsp;is not growing the way they thought it would, making the money and profits they should or wondering how to scale it bigger.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;After graduating with a Fashion degree many moons ago, I worked for some 15years within British&amp;nbsp;luxury brands small and large (you can see my resume on Linked In here:&amp;nbsp;&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/dessytsolova/"&gt;https://www.linkedin.com/in/dessytsolova/&lt;/a&gt;&amp;nbsp;) across apparel and&amp;nbsp;accessories. There isn&amp;#39;t much as a product that I haven&amp;#39;t at some point worked on.&amp;nbsp; For most of this time, I managed the creative teams and oversaw the process from Idea to Finished product and more often than not I then took that knowledge to the PR, marketing and retail shop floor.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;After leaving the last company I was employed by, I set up an online fashion manufacturing portal with the mission to demystify and simplify the fashion manufacturing process. Whilst growing the platform and working on the development of software to automate a largely hands-on process I came to the realisation that while so many competitors were jumping on this &amp;quot;trend&amp;quot; to create what they saw as just a &amp;quot;directory&amp;quot; the industry was not getting any more transparent or functional. The problem I saw&amp;nbsp;was hiding in&amp;nbsp;the lack of proper practical and honest educational support to the new influx of entrepreneurs in the industry AND support for independent brand overlooked by the governmental trade bodies.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This determination to share my experience and knowledge with fashion entrepreneurs worldwide led me to exit the platform I spent over 6 years creating and launch Fashion Insiders &amp;amp; Co. An online education and support platform and community for fashion entrepreneurs looking to launch, grow or scale their businesses.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Through our platform, we offer many FREE resources as well as online courses, in-person (via the magic of online meetings) consulting and coaching packages and soon to launch community coaching and accountability incubator.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;


&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://fashioninsi&lt;p&gt;Online fashion educational and mentoring platform helping&amp;nbsp;fashion entrepreneurs build and grow profitable fashion brands.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We specialise in helping entrepreneurs:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;- strategise how to launch new product or service based fashion business;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;- idea development from initial development and sourcing&amp;nbsp;stages to bulk manufacturing;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;- business strategy, pricing and target setting&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;- growth mindset&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Support is offered via 1:1 work, tailored to your project needs as well as offering online courses and masterclasses to consume at your own pace and time.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;

Business support for fashion brands - 1-2-1 mentoring

Real transformation happens over a longer period of time...<br>
Over the course of&nbsp;a 6-month period I will give you personalised 1 to 1 fashion business mentoring (that just happens to come with lots of great training as well). Whilst the statistic that 90% of fashion startups will fail is very true... it doesn't have to be true for you and your business!

&lt;p&gt;Hi, I’m Chris Dowling. I’ve been there and done it! With over 35 years of business experience to draw upon, I am here to help you too. You will benefit from my advice, and I will support you through the challenging changes your business needs to make it more successful wether you are a Start-Up or established business.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;My services include:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Business mentoring Business development &amp;amp; growth&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Assessment and analysis of current position&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Sales &amp;amp; marketing Cash flow and financial management&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Access to government support and grants&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Writing a Business plan&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Access to Start-Up loans.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We will define your business goals and ensure you have the knowledge, skills and processes needed to achieve them. I will be your ‘sounding board’ and ‘critical friend’, helping your business grow and expand – taking it to the next level.&lt;/p&gt;

Business Consultant

Chris Dowling

&lt;p&gt;Hi, I’m Chris Dowling. I’ve been there and done it! With over 35 years of business experience to draw upon, I am here to help you too. You will benefit from my advice, and I will support you through the challenging changes your business needs to make it more successful wether you are a Start-Up or established business.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;My services include:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Business mentoring Business development &amp;amp; growth&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Assessment and analysis of curre