FOCUS
Nineteen year old Jarrod Burke from
Market Harborough, Leicestershire, is
the owner and founder of the American
Confectionery shop "Randalls", selling
candy, sodas and other sweet items
imported directly from America.
What inspired you to start your own
business?
I’ve always had a bit of an entrepreneurial flare.
When I was 10 years old, you would find me
outside on the front lawn, flogging anything I
could find in the house (which sometimes got me
into trouble with my parents!) Because of this,
I then moved on to sweets. Parked on the front
lawn with a little table, I sold sweets for 50p a bag!
Did you enjoy school?
I was never interested in school or college.
I wanted to start making money, so left school at
16, achieving 7 GCSE's at C and above, to study
Photography at college. After a while I realised
that photography would be more a hobby than
a career, but the 2 year course helped me to
learn the social media, management & I.T skills
that I use in my business today.
How long have you been running your own
business?
My business, Randalls, has been open for four
months. In those four months, the business that is
based in a new shopping complex, has moved from
a small premises downstairs to a premises twice
the size upstairs as the business grew popular.
How did you go about financing your
business?
I looked into all types of financing for my
business. Bank loans, business cards, crowd
funding, family loans etc. Up until three months
before opening, I was arranging to borrow
around £3000 from a family member. After
looking into personal Credit Cards, I gambled
and decided to go for one of these. Being good
with money, holding a contract phone & car on
finance that has never missed a payment meant
that I had a good credit rating which enabled
me to obtain the credit card (with 19 months
int \