This week, I had the privilege of speaking at the HSBC Strategies for Success event in Bristol, part of their Small Business Growth Programme, hosted in partnership with WIRED. The room was packed with over 80 small business owners, each on their own path, each trying to build something meaningful in a world that doesn’t always make it easy.
I was invited to share my story in a fireside chat, the highs, the lows, and the lessons learned from founding Trunki, scaling it globally, and bouncing back from challenges that could have easily derailed the whole thing.
I spoke about resilience, not the buzzword version, but the kind you discover when your back’s against the wall. When a court decision doesn’t go your way. When a product launch misses the mark. When the journey you mapped out ends up looking more like a maze.
Because that’s what building a business really looks like.
It’s not a neat line on a graph. It’s a series of scrappy decisions, painful learnings, and the ability to keep going when the plan falls apart. That’s what I call turning setbacks into superpowers.
Some of the questions I heard from attendees were ones I’ve wrestled with myself:
- How do I scale with limited resources?
- How do I protect my ideas?
- How do I keep momentum when things get tough?
The truth is, there’s no single roadmap. But there are principles.
For me, it’s always been about staying laser-focused on the customer, designing with purpose, and telling a story people care about.
And increasingly, it’s also about using your own experience, not just your expertise, to build something that matters. People don’t just buy products, they buy the values and personality behind them.
So thank you to HSBC and WIRED for curating such a thoughtful event, one that wasn’t just about spreadsheets and strategies, but about mindset, community, and courage.
And to the small business founders I met: you’re doing the hard thing. Keep going.
Your next breakthrough might be just beyond the next setback.