My VIP Card
Maddy Alexander Grout
UK
Maddy founded of My VIP Card in 2017. She realized that she could connect the community with small businesses and help people to save money at the same time.
Fail fast fail hard , then learn and grow
Questions & Answers
Praveen
Tell us about yourself and background about the startup.
Maddy Alexander Grout
My VIP Card have been running since December 2017, My VIP Card was born after the birth of my first child. I suffered with post-natal psychosis a nasty mental health condition, I was housebound for 3 months. After connecting with my community, I realized that my mental health was so much better, it was a really challenging time in my life and I developed a love for helping small businesses.
My VIP Card is Crowdfunding and you can find further details on https://www.crowdcube.com/ companies /my-vip-card-limited/pitches/bj9eXZ
To know more about amazing work done by Maddy and her team, please visithttps://myvipcard.co.uk/
Praveen
How and when did the “eureka moment” came to you? – When you came up with this idea?
Maddy Alexander Grout
The idea for My VIP Card came in the middle of the night at 4am on a sleepless night, what if there was a small business support scheme that helped them to get customers, but saved people money at the same time?
My VIP Card launched with 80 discounts, now nearly 4 years later we have developed an app and now have a product with over 5,000 discounts to help people to save money on just about anything
Praveen
How did you come up with the name?
Maddy Alexander Grout
I wanted “My” so that people had ownership of it, VIP used to stand for very important parent, our target audience are mainly parents, but it makes the user feel special! It used to be a card, now an app
Praveen
What is your WHY?
Maddy Alexander Grout
I wanted to give back to the community that saved my life, I was in a very dark place and supporting local saved me. I wanted to help those businesses and help mums with their mental health, I developed the employee benefits side because I have a background in HR and employers need to think about how they look after their staff, and their local community.
Praveen
How many founders are in your startup? Can you shortly describe your role in the startup?
Maddy Alexander Grout
Just me at the moment but I outsource the things I am not so good at, I look after sales, partnerships, social media, strategy and anything people related. Nicola is our operations manager, she deals with the business plan, marketing strategy, funding applications and we outsource admin and accounts.
Praveen
What is USP for your startup?
Maddy Alexander Grout
We are the only loyalty franchise in the UK , we have people who run their own businesses on the ground helping us to grow our product. We are also the only small business loyalty scheme that offers employee and member benefits.
Praveen
Do you see a global presence for your startup? Which key countries you plan to target?
Maddy Alexander Grout
Yes 100% the business model is really scalable , we would like to aim for USA , Australia, India and Canada first.
Praveen
What was your biggest fear, prior to starting the journey as a founder? How did you overcome this fear?
Maddy Alexander Grout
That I would run out of money, I have been bootstrapping since day one, and it has been tough , but we have managed to find some investors to help us to start the journey.
Praveen
Where do you see your startup in next 5 years?
Maddy Alexander Grout
I see us being a household name in the consumer market , and a name recognized by employers in the employee benefits market, I can see us selling to one of our competitors in the next 5 years, this is our aim so that we can get a good return for our investors.
Praveen
What will you call success for your startup?
Maddy Alexander Grout
I am ambitious and I always said that I wanted to be a millionaire by the time I am 40, I have 3 years to do that! I already feel successful though, I think it’s a mindset , and when I help people and inspire people that makes me feel like I am doing something great!
Praveen
How do you see impact of Covid-19 on your business?
Maddy Alexander Grout
We pretty much stopped trading last year, all of our small businesses stopped trading so we effectively didn’t have a product, but we stayed visible, we supported the businesses we work with and actually managed to grow, I feel if we can grow during a pandemic we can REALLY grow outside it!
Praveen
If you had to give ONE piece of advice to someone starting out on entrepreneurial journey then what will it be?
Maddy Alexander Grout
“Fail fast fail hard , then learn and grow!”
