Richard Eddington had been thinking about launching his own business for years and finally took the leap to launch Cottage Kitchen in March of 2021. Richard said: “At the beginning of last year when we were in lockdown, I just thought to myself ‘what am I going to do with my time?’ I knew I wanted to do something creative and that was the boost I needed to start my business.”
Cottage Kitchen is an app marketplace for all types of traders working in and around the food industry. The Cottage Kitchen App allows artisan food producers of the UK, and indeed the world, to reach a wider marketplace. At the same time it provides potential smaller customers such as independent shops and restaurants a sourcing service to easily locate and communicate with the artisan and speciality food producers.
Richard’s wife runs a village shop, and 2 years ago attended a trade show that Richard joined her on. Richard said: “I noticed there were some really nice stalls there. There were lots of people paying a lot of money to go to the show and to exhibit.”
Richard’s trip to the trade show got him thinking about the many great suppliers and businesses that wouldn’t get the opportunity to market themselves at trade shows in this way. Richard said: “It got me thinking about how I could bridge that gap sometime in the future.”
Richard started thinking about launching a smartphone application, an app, and created Cottage Kitchen. Richard said: “The app is an evolving trade show on the smartphone of anyone who wants to look at it.
“The costs of tradeshows and advertising and market stalls are phenomenal to small businesses. But the cost of the app will only be £3 per week, and the subscriber and business can change the material on the app as many times as needed.” Users can upload product photos, videos, daily specials and it can be as dynamic a tool as the user wishes.
Richard’s wife who was aware of the support on offer recommended he contacted Cumbria Business Growth Hub in order to speak to someone who could help and offer advice. After explaining he wanted to start his own business, Richard was enrolled on the Business Start-Up Support scheme which offers free support and advice to those wanting to start a business, or those in the early years of trading. The package includes a 3-day course on starting a business, one-to-one meetings with a business adviser, training and help with a business plan.
He was allocated a business adviser, Gail Gravett who was able to support Richard with 1-2-1 expert advice. When asked about the support on offer, Richard said: “Gail’s input has been great. I came into this with an old school view of how to market such a product. Gail quickly made me understand that it wasn’t going to cut it anymore, and I needed to be more multi-media savvy.”
“She prompted me with things that I wouldn’t have previously thought of and also came up with the idea of using Cumbria as a blueprint of how the app could be rolled out across the country.”
He added: “Because of the vast amount of fine food producers in the county and the fact that Cumbria is a tourist destination, the idea is to use our initial marketing as an initial blueprint of how it might work in other areas of the country.”
When asked about his future plans for Cottage Kitchen, Richard said: “I’m going to start introducing new features such as video conferencing and augmented reality.
“As well as expanding the functionality of the app, I started getting interested across all continents. But this year I want to crack the tourist areas of Cumbria, Devon, Cornwall, Yorkshire and areas of Scotland.”
Are you interested in setting up your own business? Contact Cumbria Business Growth Hub today on info@cumbriagrowthhub.co.uk or call the office on 0844 257 84 50.
The funding that supports the Growth Hub comes from a range of sources including Cumbria Chamber of Commerce, the European Regional Development Fund, Sellafield Ltd., Carlisle City Council, South Lakeland District Council, Penrith Industrial BID and Cumbria LEP. The Growth Hub is receiving up to £2,528,767 of funding from the England European Regional Development Fund as part of the European Structural and Investment Funds Growth Programme 2014-2020. The BSUS project is receiving up to £1,112,686 of funding from the England European Regional Development Fund as part of the European Structural and Investment Funds Growth Programme 2014-2020. The Ministry for Housing Communities and Local Government is the Managing Authority for European Regional Development Fund. Established by the European Union, the European Regional Development Fund helps local areas stimulate their economic development by investing in projects which will support innovation, businesses, create jobs and local community regenerations. For more information, click here.