Business Lessons From Lunch With The White Company Founder, Chrissie Rucker
Last week, Red magazine hosted its annual ‘This Is A Smart Women’ week. This is an opportunity to meet the founders of some of our most iconic British brands and learn how they went from kitchen table start-up to scale-up. Last Wednesday was an opportunity to have lunch with one of the female founders who inspires me most, Chrissie Rucker, founder of The White Company.
If you’re not familiar with The White Company, it’s a premium lifestyle British brand with products across the interiors, clothing, footwear and beauty market. Synonymous with fluffy white towels, Egyptian cotton bedding and scented candles, the brand’s genius resides in the idea that we can find peace and tranquillity in today’s VUCA world through the simple pleasure of a Seychelles scented candle, with its notes of fresh bergamot, bright orange and tropical coconut, or the crispness of a freshly laundered, high thread Egyptian cotton sheet.
If ever a business owner personified their brand, it is Chrissie Rucker. One of Britain’s most successful businesswomen, Chrissie is softly spoken, gentle and considered. She has the meditative presence of a Zen yoga teacher. Despite her success, I was struck by how humble and understated Chrissie is. She’s the embodiment of the restrained nature of her brand, and incredibly down to earth.
When we look at a successful brand like The White Company, it’s all too easy to forget its humble origins. Like so many businesses, The White Company was, in fact, launched from the spare bedroom of her then boyfriend, the businessman Nick Wheeler, with a 12-page mail order catalogue and £6,000 inheritance from her grandmother.
I took so much inspiration from Chrissie’s after-lunch talk that I figured it would be fun to share some of her business lessons.
How Did The Idea To Sell Only White Products Come About?
Chrissie joked that she was trying to show Nick Wheeler (her then boyfriend) what excellent wife material she was by volunteering to decorate his first home. Because she loved the aesthetics of white - and to disguise her lack of confidence in interior design - she decided to keep it simple opting for a palette of neutrals. She set off shopping for white linens, towels, bathrobes, china and napkins for his new home and discovered these were surprisingly hard to find.
The white items Chrissie did find were either cheap, poor quality embroidered designs which looked like they might fall apart quickly, or luxury brand, fabulous quality with high thread counts that were very expensive. At the designer end of the market, Chrissie found that the sales assistants could be snooty; some even directed the 24-year-old to the cheaper ranges in the store.
Chrissie discovered that she was not the only person looking for good quality white homeware at an accessible price. Chrissie and Nick went to stay with his sister who explained that she’d had a similar experience. When she said “wouldn’t it be brilliant if there was a company that just sold white things?” Chrissie realised that she had the kernel of an idea.
A journalist by background, Chrissie rang several department stores and told them she was doing a piece for the Sunday Times about ‘white in homes.’ She asked what percentage of bed linen sales were in white and discovered that it was consistently over 50%. After visits to a trade show, she found that she could buy the same Egyptian cotton bedding sold by designer labels and sell it at more affordable prices by cutting out the middleman. In fact, one of her first products was an embroidered bedspread made in Portugal which had previously been sold by a big brand for the £250, back in the 90’s and which Chrissie retailed for a more affordable £85.
Chrissie’s mission became twofold. Firstly, to offer first-class designer quality at affordable, high-street prices. And secondly, to create a company where everyone feels welcome and which gives great customer service.
How Was Chrissie’s Background as a Journalist Helpful?
Working on magazines like Harpers, Vogue and Brides taught Chrissie how to put a magazine together, write engaging copy, as well as styling. She was able to apply this knowledge and experience to her new mail-order business because it was in many ways like putting together a mini magazine. She drew on her copywriting skills and contacts book to put together press releases to try to get editorial coverage as she had no money for advertising. This resulted in brilliant coverage in magazines; an important factor in bringing in early sales.
What Business Experience Did Chrissie Have?
Chrissie was 24 when she started The White Company. She did a three-day business course with an organisation called Centec - the government scheme backing enterprise at the time. They awarded Chrissie a grant of £50 per week for 6 months, which paid for her food. She sold some shares her grandmother had left her for £6,000 and used this as working capital.
Chrissie’s early mentor in business was her husband, Nick Wheeler, founder of the Charles Tyrwhitt shirt company. He’d already started his business whilst at university and he used that experience to help Chrissie put together her first business plan. (Note, many founders are advised that writing a business plan is a waste of time. This could not be further from the truth. A business plan is an essential early activity as it sets out your best thinking about your business, your goals and your roadmap to success.
How Did The White Company Get Started?
Chrissie started with a list of friends, friends of friends, her mother’s friends - about 500 people - and sent them a 12-page brochure which she put together herself. She also sent out press releases to get editorial coverage, which led to features in magazines which generated new customers.
Growth was very gradual, but it started to increase as customers recommended the brand to other people within their circle of influence. As sales went up, she gained cash flow and invested in more marketing and products. In its first year, The White Company turned over £80,000 and just about broke even.
The first store opened after six years and Chrissie took on her first Managing Director. Having a bricks and mortar store meant the brand really started to make an impact. But the growth came from constantly looking after old customers, looking for new ones and expanding the product range.
The company developed naturally according to the different phases in Chrissie’s own life. The desire for pretty nightdresses when she was pregnant led to a nightwear line. She started The Little White Company, offering children’s bedding, clothes and nursery furniture, after the birth of her first child in 1996. Each year, new fragrances, clothing, gifts, Christmas products, home and garden furniture were added to the mix. What started as a 12-page brochure now runs to 130 pages.
What Personal Qualities Helped to Make The White Company a Success?
Chrissie believes that the answer to this question very much depends on what sort of person you are and where you can most add value to your business. Chrissie brought in a CEO relatively early to focus on the financial and operational side of the business. This enabled her to be very focused on the four areas where her strengths lie:
Keeping the brand vision clear and true.
Doing everything possible to give customers a great experience.
Building a brilliant team across the business, including the supplier base.
Driving continuous improvement.
Chrissie also draws on her experiences as a child of riding competitively to help her manage the challenges of running a business.
“Riding means you have days when it goes really well and other days when it goes really badly. You just get back on and have another go and try not make the same mistake again.”
What Does Chrissie Mean By Keeping The Brand Vision Clear And True?
When building a brand, Chrissie believes it’s vital to be clear what you’re not, as well as what you are. For example, The White Company products are predominantly in shades of white. In fact, it was five years before other soft neutral tones were introduced into the colour palette. Chrissie personally signs off on all new products, ensuring that they are consistent with the brand’s mantra of ‘perfect simplicity.’
There have been times when the choice of products wavered away from the vision – when bits of colour snuck in. To counteract this, every three years, the company does a very thorough brand audit of all its products. They put customer feedback at the heart of everything the company does and do a lot of customer insight and focus groups.
How Did Chrissie Scale The White Company?
One of the key reasons why Chrissie has been able to scale The White Company so successfully is her clarity about where she can add value to the business, and where she cannot. By her own admission, she’s ‘hopeless at operations and structure,’ nor is she very good at numbers. This explains why Chrissie moved quickly to bring in a CEO whose role was to put in place company structure, allowing her to ‘quietly get on with her job’ as custodian of the brand. This appointment of a CEO led rapidly to the appointment of a Director of Marketing.
Chrissie is firmly of the view that you are only as good as the people around you, employing a team of experts at the top of their game. Chrissie also appointed the respected retail executive, Tony Campbell, to act as Chairman. Campbell came with very significant retail experience at senior management and non-executive director level and was well placed to advise on trends within the retail industry as well as on expansion plans.
In common with many entrepreneurs, Chrissie confesses to having been a control freak until she went on a course to learn how to delegate. Once she learnt how to brief her key reports properly, Chrissie was able to let go of those parts of the job that were not her forte to focus on those areas that are her strengths.
Hire people with the skills to do what you can't. Delegation and knowing who to employ are key: I went on courses to learn the art of both.
The business plan she wrote when she founded the business meant that Chrissie was able to stay on track and consistently double turnover every year during her first ten years in business. Careful planning is also how she’s survived and thrived during four recessions.
Together with her CEO and Finance Director, they re-forecast growth every quarter (something I strongly recommend the businesses I work with do). Based on the business plan, the team utilises profits to invest in the company, for example a new warehouse to meet future customer demand, its digital-first strategy, omnichannel marketing and overseas expansion.
We've always grown strong and safe. We're only just launching as an online company in the US now, as a 20-year-old brand. You must establish yourself in your home country first, before getting distracted by global ambition.
At A Challenging Time for the High Street, How Does The White Company Stay Relevant?
The company has traded through four recessions and in fact, started during a recession. Chrissie believes that having a clear brand vision means you have something to stick to when times are hard. This clear brand vision means really knowing what your brand is and just as importantly, what it is not, having a distinct point of view, differentiating yourself from the competition and then sticking to your position.
With customers currently very cautious and choosing their purchases wisely, this strong brand ethos enables The White Company to stretch across multiple categories in the “premium lifestyle” space and feature highly in the minds of their loyal customers.
In Conclusion
The White Company started life, just like any of our businesses, as a tiny seed of an idea. By writing a solid business plan, following sound business principles, and learning the art of delegation, Chrissie Rucker has built a fast-growing, premium lifestyle British brand with products across the interiors, clothing and beauty market from a 12-page brochure Whatever sector our business is in, we can all draw lessons from Chrissie Rucker which will serve us well as we launch, grow and scale our own business.
Over To You
What was your key takeaway from this article? If you shop at The White Company, what is it you love most about the brand? I love reading your feedback so please do reply in the comments box below.
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About The Author
I’m Denyse Whillier, and I was a Chief Executive for 8 years, I spent 25 years in senior management and leadership roles and trained at Cranfield School of Management. For examples of my work, check out my portfolio of case studies.
I made the leap from corporate to founding my boutique business consultancy and have worked with a wide range of small and medium sized businesses, many of which are purpose-led. My mission is to close the gender gap in business and make it easier for women to start, grow and scale a successful business without compromising their values.
An experienced and empathetic business advisor, I’m always happy to talk you through how I can help. Use this link to book a friendly (and free) chat at any time.