We last spoke to Simon Welford in November 2004 when his business, Online Exhibits, was less than one-year-old. He admits he has learned a thing or two about business since then and has agreed to share his experiences here.

How has your business been getting along since we last spoke?
Really well, we have extended our range of products and have a brand new online poster shop now as well as the print shop. We have over 400 items in our online store so we have really pushed things on in the last few months. Things are looking good.

What do you feel you have learnt about running a business and yourself in this time?
Firstly, that if you want your business to succeed, you really have to put the hours in. You can’t just build your website and sit back waiting for the orders to come in.
It takes a lot of promotion and networking to get orders and that takes a lot of time and a fair amount of money. I haven’t regretted one minute of starting my own business, so I guess I have found out that this is what I really want to do in life and that’s good.

What about being your own boss, has it turned out how you expected? What have been the main down and up sides?
I have enjoyed being my own boss although it is a little tough some days. Sometimes it would be nice to not have to log on to the computer for a day or to not have to worry about where the next order is coming from, but on the whole it is the best decision I ever made. The main downside is not always having enough money to advertise or buy new equipment if it’s needed. It’s difficult to do all the things that you want to do or push your business forward if money is tight but basically you just have to be patient and wait until your budget allows it. The upside is simply that you are the boss, you make the decisions and you make the money. It’s a good feeling when you have a good sale and know that the money you have bought in goes to you and not to someone further up the food chain.

What do you feel has been your biggest achievement since starting up?
Just the fact that I am still trading and the business is debt free and financially very healthy. So many companies fold in the first year that this is a pretty good achievement on its own.

What has been your biggest disappointment?
When I originally started the business I was solely selling original works of art by artists in the UK and Europe. The pieces were usually priced between £100 and £1000 pounds. I quickly found out that it is really, really hard to sell a piece of art by an unknown artist for that sort of money, especially online where the customer can’t actually see the piece of art. I quickly discovered that this wasn’t the way forward and I now sell only art prints and posters which are considerably cheaper and are by household names like Salvador Dali, LS Lowry & Andy Warhol, so I don’t have to sell the artist as well as the art. This was very disappointing at first but has since turned in to the best thing I ever did, as sales are great and the profit margin is much better.