Here is the full transcript of Nicholas Hänny’s talk titled “How To Start Your Own Business Without Investors” at TEDxHochschuleLuzern conference.
In this TEDx talk, Nicholas Hänny, co-founder and CEO of NIKIN, a sustainable clothing brand from Switzerland, shares his tips on starting a business without investors. He emphasizes that success is not about the idea but about its implementation, and that entrepreneurs should not strive for perfection but instead focus on progress with low-budget methods.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
Hello, everybody. I’m Nicholas Hänny. I’m the CEO and co-founder of a startup, a young, sustainable clothing brand that plants one tree for each product that we sell. But I’m not here today to talk about sustainability or tree planting. I’m here to talk about how to build a business without investors.
I’m talking about that, because I built my business with only 5,000 francs and we don’t have any investors up to this point. So two things I want to tell you before I start talking about my tips. The first thing is we never had a business plan and never needed one. So that’s one thing I want to tell you. Just start without the business plan.
And the second thing is that the five tips I’m going to give you now are actually pretty basic and simple and might seem obvious to most of you. But I’m trying to go on putting it into context that you see some examples of how we dealt with that.
So the first tip is actually pretty simple. It is, it’s not about the idea. It’s about the implementation. What I mean with that is that a lot of times people come to me telling me, hey, I want to start my own business, but I don’t have the idea. I don’t know what to do. But the thing that I’m telling them then is that you don’t need a great idea. It’s not about the idea that you’re successful. It’s about the implementation.
So you don’t need a great idea to start and neither to be successful. I want to give you now three examples of companies that exactly did that. The first example is actually a pretty famous one. It’s of actually the biggest social network in the world. It’s Facebook.
Facebook, when they started, it was a terrible idea, in my opinion. They wanted to build a social network, which at that point was already pretty a bad idea because MySpace was huge. MySpace dominated it. Facebook also only started with Harvard students. But after time they started to implement it better, have better ideas, improved it, and now they’re one of the biggest companies in the world.
The second tip might be a little bit less, or example might be a little bit less famous. It’s Lyft. Lyft is basically the same as Uber. Uber started in the States, and actually everybody knows what Uber is now. So Lyft took the same idea, and usually it’s a bad idea just to copy someone, but they did it better. They implemented the stuff better. In the process they did certain things better, and now certain cities, they’re actually bigger than Uber.
Then the third example is maybe the most famous one. It’s Google. Google was not the first search engine. It was not a great idea to just do another search engine when they started. But as you know, they improved their algorithm better, their search engine is better, and now they’re the biggest one in the world.
So all of them actually just started with not a very great idea, but implemented it much better. So just do something. It’s not about the idea, it’s about the implementation.
Now let me go over to the second tip. The second tip is to not strive for perfection. So what I mean with that is when you start a business, you usually don’t really have a lot of money. You cannot afford the people that are the experts to either work for you or pay them that they consult you and help you.
So it means you have to do everything yourself, and that’s not always that easy. So let me give you actually four personal examples of how we did that. So the first example is of our first T-shirt that we had. The first T-shirts were from Asia, and only then we shifted it to Europe.
But we didn’t know that the sizes from Asia are totally different from European sizes. So our XL was actually more like an M, and customers are not that happy about it. However, we sold the product, we got feedback, we learned about it, and by that we got better and better and better. And it was much better to just do it and sell it, and by that have a faster learning phase. So that was already very important.
Now the second example is of our first photo shooting in Switzerland, where we started to take product pictures for ourselves. We didn’t have money to pay a photographer. We were thinking of it, but it was just way too expensive. So our setup that you can see is only like $30.
The lamp was from a local construction site. The camera was borrowed from a friend. The thing I have in my hand in the picture is styrofoam. And the thing in the background, this is actually the only thing that cost us $30. The pictures were not great, but they were good enough to start, and by that we got, again, feedback.
We learned, and we were faster than others who waited for perfect pictures. So now the third thing is an Instagram post from us in the beginning. If you look at it, it looks pretty horrible in my opinion, but we posted more than other companies. We had a higher posting frequency.
We got by that more engagement, more comments, more likes, more everything, and in the end we actually won by that.
We also learned which posts work well, which not, and it was just more important to just do it rather than waiting for the perfect post.
Now the last example is actually my favorite example because it’s our first towel that we had. Our first towel though had a problem. When you went to the beach or to the local swimming pool and you were lying on the grass on the beach and you took it up the towel, you basically ripped away all the leaves and all the grass. So you took away almost the whole forest. That was horrible. Customers hated it, but some actually liked it, but nevertheless we learned from it. We learned more about material.
The next one was much better, and again, we sold it. We got some more customers and so on, and that was super important to not wait for the perfect product, to just do it.
Now the third tip. The third tip is also pretty obvious and many people, you know that probably, but it’s ask for help. A lot of times we just ask people, be it people we know, be it complete strangers, if they could help us in something. And you’ll be amazed at how many people actually want to help, how much good there’s out there.
And also don’t forget, the worst thing that can happen is when you ask to just get a no. So let me give you two examples of which the first one is more of a personal one. In the picture you can see the parents of my co-founder.
In the beginning we had a lot of demand for our winter hats. So we asked them if they could help us actually manufacture them. So you see them stitching the labels onto the winter hats. They also packed until three in the morning our orders, and also we asked friends if they could help us. And all of them helped us for free, so you just have to ask. But it’s not only about people you know, it’s also about complete strangers.
So the next example shows a situation when we moved into a new office and we needed new furniture. We thought that it might make more sense to actually use used furniture. So we asked if some people have it in the cellar, because all of you probably also have some furniture they don’t use in their cellar.
So 17 people commented, 20 people direct messaged me, and in the end we had more offers for good furniture than we actually needed. So this actually shows that in the end, you just have to ask. The worst thing you can get is a no. And if you don’t know how to ask the right people, go on LinkedIn, Google it. There’s many, many, many places where you can find out who to ask in the end.
Now the next tip, also a simple one, but if you don’t have a lot of money and you’re starting your own business, super important. It’s be flexible, and by flexible I mean be really, really, really flexible. It’s again the same story. You cannot hire people that are doing the hard work for you. You cannot hire people that do 24-7 customer service for you.
You have to do most of the things yourself in the beginning. So I’ll also give you examples. The first example is an example of our first meetings. We did not have an office, we did not have the money to rent one. So we had to do meetings in bars or restaurants.
We did that either before our regular jobs or studies or afterwards. As you can see in the picture, it was of course afterwards now in this situation. And we did that for around one and a half years until we could actually afford our first real office.
Now the next example is, if you look at the picture, it’s a toilet and you might ask yourself, why the hell is the toilet in the picture? So that was a place where I had to work a lot. It was super important for me. It is because we did customer service ourselves, and when you got a customer service request, you had to answer it pretty fast.
So I used these five minutes doing whatever people do in the toilet to tell customers, yes, you can send back the package and yes, we’re going to send you another one. I did that all the time, I had to, as well as using five minutes in the bus to write an email. And these minutes and this flexibility really, really matters in the beginning.
So now going to the last tip. The last tip is that you should read the best book in the world. A lot of times I get asked by people, how do I do marketing? How do I find a supplier? How do I do video editing? How do this, that, or this? And first of all, if you go back to tip number three, of course I helped them in that moment. But at the same time I also tell them, hey, read the best book in the world because it’s all in there.
And so the best book in the world is Google. As simple as it might sound, but all the things you want to know, they’re on Google. Google how to build a sustainable business, Google how to do Facebook ads, how to have a sustainable clothing brand, and so on. And it’s almost all written in there.
Of course, if at some point you have a list of 20 things and you know these things you have to do, then it might help if you ask someone with experience to tell you on what to focus. But then go back to tip number three again, which is asking. And they then might ask you or might tell you what you have to do in that moment. So that’s it.
These are my five basic tips. And just one more message I would like to give you is, if you really want to do something, you don’t need a great idea, just do it. If you just go out there and do it, remember this, that you’re already ahead of 99% of all potential entrepreneurs. And so it’s basically just about doing it.
And everything else comes in the process and implementation. So thank you very much for your attention.
SUMMARY OF THIS TALK:
Nicholas Hänny’s talk, “How To Start Your Own Business Without Investors,” provides practical advice for aspiring entrepreneurs. Here’s a summary of his key points:
It’s About Implementation, Not the Idea: Hänny emphasizes that success in business is less about having a unique idea and more about how you implement it. He cites examples of companies like Facebook, Lyft, and Google, which weren’t the first in their fields but succeeded due to superior execution.
Strive for Progress, Not Perfection: Starting with limited resources, he stresses the importance of progress over perfection. He shares personal anecdotes, such as their first T-shirt sizing issues, budget photography setup, initial social media posts, and the first towel product, to illustrate learning from mistakes and improving over time.
Ask for Help: Hänny encourages seeking assistance, noting that people are often willing to help. He shares experiences of getting support from his co-founder’s parents in manufacturing winter hats and acquiring used furniture from people in the community.
Be Flexible: Flexibility is crucial, especially when resources are tight. Hänny talks about holding meetings in bars and restaurants before affording an office and handling customer service in unconventional places like toilets to stay responsive.
Utilize Available Resources Like Google: He recommends using resources like Google to learn and solve problems, highlighting its effectiveness in finding information on various aspects of running a business.
Hänny concludes by motivating listeners to act on their business aspirations, emphasizing that taking action puts one ahead of most potential entrepreneurs. He underscores that success comes through doing and learning in the process of implementation.