My first business failed, but today my company turns over $4 million. Here’s what failure taught me

As the founder of Roccoco Botanicals, I’ve been in the spotlight in recent years. After being named the fastest-growing Australian beauty company in the AFR Fast 100, we’re turning over $4.2 million in product sales annually, with a large part of our market in the US and NZ. 

But it wasn’t always this way. 

My ‘overnight’ success story has taken decades of hard work, and my first business, Eclogite, actually failed. 

Here’s what that failure taught me.

Know your numbers

It might sound obvious, but you need a fairly solid understanding of business financials for a business to survive. When I launched Eclogite, although I had a solid beauty industry background, I didn’t understand how to price my products to make a profit. My products were priced too low, and I didn’t know about break-even costings. 

Business skills and acumen are just as crucial as your trade or product — so I now put as much energy into becoming better at business as I do into improving my products and knowledge. Having those basic business fundamentals will help you on the path to success.

Mindset matters

When I launched my first business, I didn’t have the confidence to really build something successful — my limiting beliefs got in the way of me achieving what I was capable of. My mindset was all wrong — I didn’t think like a business owner. I didn’t want to take risks, and I was terrified of making mistakes or failing. This also meant I didn’t want to be putting myself out there in the market as an authority.

No one had heard of me, and that worked against me. 

Now, with Roccoco Botanicals, I’ve changed my mindset, and realised fear causes hesitation. I can now control my fear and see it as a factor for success. It’s helped me focus on where we need to go, and empowered us to achieve rapid growth. 

Fail fast, fail hard and learn from your mistakes.

Become an expert

When you start a business, you’re an expert in something — in your products, in your services, in your business. No one knows more about your business than you do, so position yourself as an expert. 

By putting yourself forward as an expert authority, people will naturally begin to gravitate towards you and value what you have to say. It builds their trust and confidence in you, and takes the pain out of selling.

People who respect your expertise will willingly buy from you.

Invest in yourself

Being in business is a continuous learning journey. I’ve spent more than $500,000 over the past 10 years upgrading my skills in marketing, copywriting and business strategy. This has meant I’ve been able to grow the business, while also improving the skills of our clinic owners, making it easier for them to sell our products. 

I also believe in finding mentors to help you learn and grow. I’ve had mentors and business coaches for the past 11 years to get me where I am today. My current coach has played a vital role in expanding my ideas around identifying opportunities, and my previous coach really helped me get out of my own way. He showed me I was playing too small.

Lead by example

When I didn’t have the belief that my business would succeed, neither did the people around me. So now, I lead by example, and aim to inspire my team to work towards our success. 

I’d never expect someone on my team to do something that I wouldn’t be capable of doing if I needed, and I’ll always pitch in when we’re rushing for a deadline. They’ll see me boxing and labelling things, and getting hands-on with our work. It’s a good reminder for me of how the business started, and also gives me an opportunity to see firsthand the work conditions they’re in and the processes that are part of our daily operations. It’s a chance to keep learning and improving. 

As a leader, I own my mistakes. I’m human. Sometimes I stuff up or get things wrong, but I’ll own the mistake and won’t blame someone else. I want to lead with integrity, and build an environment where we can all be honest when things don’t go to plan.

Still learning

While Roccoco Botanicals is scaling rapidly, I know there are still plenty of lessons for me to learn, and mistakes I might make along the way. 

But that’s OK. I look back now and realise I’m grateful Eclogite didn’t succeed. It wasn’t the right business, but I learned a lot.

None of us has a business crystal ball, so be open to new opportunities, because you never know what’s around the corner.