Inspirational Women: She Grows Veg Founders Kate Cotterill & Lucy Hutchings

Kate Cotterill, CEO of She Grows Veg, discusses the company’s inception – inspired by Lucy Hutchings’ Instagram following and market potential for unusual seed varieties.

She talks about the gender bias they faced in securing a business account and loan, how the business has grown, how it’s working with the community to get everyone growing and why building a network is the most important thing for female entrepreneurs.

What inspired you to launch She Grows Veg, and how did your backgrounds in marketing and jewellery design influence your approach to building the brand?

Lucy and I met seven years ago. We were doing a garden design course at Beth Chatto Gardens and we sat next to each other on the first day, and then we sat next to each other for a whole year while we were still studying. During that time, Lucy started @shegrowsveg on Instagram, and she shared her growing journey with her Instagram followers and grew a following there.

She got a sense while she was doing that, that there was some potential in the seed market to sell unusual varieties. As she introduced her followers to her unusual veg, they started saying, where do I get these seeds? And she had to say, well, you can’t buy these in the UK. And so she came to me about two years ago and said, listen, I’ve got an idea. I think people want these seeds. I’d spent 25 years in marketing so I went away and did some market research and saw there was a very clear opportunity for a really interesting and new approach to being a seed company.

So having done the research and obviously getting the feedback that Lucy had, we decided to start a company and She Grows Veg was born.

Lucy’s background, as you mentioned in your question, is jewellery design, and she used to design couture jewellery for quite famous faces. And what she lends to the whole thing is, is the creative side. So she takes all of our photography, and she creates a lot of our content. She’s very much the frontwoman of the brand because she’s the expert grower. She also does the growing in our trial garden and farming some of our seeds, so that’s her background, and obviously, my background, 25 years in marketing, has allowed us to grow the brand very quickly. I know which marketing levers I want to pull. I know what best practice looks like, and I’m almost obsessed with running the company well. And I think the 25 years of experience have really benefited the business because we knew what our plan was. We were really clear about it from the beginning and how we wanted to communicate with the world.

You faced challenges securing a bank account and business loan due to gender bias. How did you navigate these obstacles, and what advice would you give to other female entrepreneurs facing similar hurdles?

There were lots of challenges! Securing a bank account and business loan due to general gender bias was a huge hurdle. It’s really interesting, we went out to all the high street banks and no one wanted to let us open a business account. Really still to this day, we don’t particularly know why, but we managed to get an account with Monzo, which has functioned okay, but it’s not really sophisticated enough for us. We’re now looking at another banking option, and actually, now that we’ve been up and running for a while, and we’ve got financials that we can share with people, I think it’s going to be easier.

Where the real gender bias issue came in was actually when we were trying to secure a business loan. We were going out for around £25,000, not an enormous amount. I tried everything. I approached banks and loan companies. Some of the loan companies that would lend us money had a rate of around 40% per cent, which is absolutely outrageous and untenable for a small business. Eventually, I ended up chatting to a broker who said to me, I’m really sorry to say this, in 2024 which it was at the time, but actually, as women, you’re going to find it harder to secure a loan, which I found absolutely shocking.

We finally managed to get a loan through the biz Britain, British business bank, and they were superb. It was a very rigorous process, they checked our business plan and everything we were doing, but they were the only people that would lend. In the end, we couldn’t get a loan that was below 40% interest from anywhere else. So, they’ve been superb, and they really backed us and helped us out.

We’re at another phase now where we’re trying to get an investor on board for the business. Research shows that only 18% of businesses that achieve investor status, whether that’s from bench capital or angel investors, and only 18% of those are women or female-founded, so it is challenging for us. There is a perception issue, and it’s a perception issue we have found even in the horticultural industry. Quite early on, we actually had an older, quite senior member of the horticultural industry come up to us and say, well, people don’t really want what you’re doing. And, you know, it’s sort of a hobby business. And they saw us as not something serious, and that two women that wanted to do something on the side wasn’t a proper business. It was really interesting that that was the first thought. Maybe that’s a slightly generational thing, but it just shows the sorts of problems women have in starting up businesses and the hurdles that you have to come across.

I’m delighted to say that we’ve smashed quite a lot of those hurdles quite quickly in our first year and a bit, but it certainly has been really, really challenging at times, and it’s only now that we can show our success that people are starting to take us seriously.

Crowdfunding played a crucial role in getting She Grows Veg off the ground. What lessons did you learn from that process, and what would you do differently if you had to do it again?

We did some crowdfunding very, very early on, we raised just over £20,000 through crowdfunding to get the business off the ground, and this was absolutely crucial. It paid for things like our initial marketing comms, our first office, buying some of our first seeds, and even the desks in our office, so it was absolutely vital.

What was also brilliant is that we had this sort of springboard in the following that Lucy had created on her Instagram, which was great, because actually a lot of people on Instagram were really interested in seeing a company like us get off the ground and were happy to back it. And so the people who crowd-funded actually were the first people to receive seeds. So they were effectively buying seed packages, or they were buying the participation to become one of our trial growers.

We now have an amazing team of trial growers who grow our seeds all over the UK, in very different climates and environments and conditions, and they’re hugely valuable parts of the business. These early supporters really got us off the ground. With crowdfunding, it is important to have quite defined packages that you’re selling if you’re not giving away shares in the business, and I think we did that really well.

So we offered some really nice seed collections, early access stuff, the trial grower stuff, that were really succinct and appealing offerings for people to invest in effectively ahead of time. And no doubt, we wouldn’t have got as much money out of that process if we didn’t have that social media following. So the promotion and the social media and the PR around that crowdfunding phase was absolutely vital and we are incredibly grateful for all that.

Community seems to be at the heart of She Grows Veg, from supporting female founders to helping people grow their own food. How do you foster engagement and inclusivity in your community?

I think the crucial thing is that we want to be a really inclusive company. So obviously, we’re there for the people who buy our seeds, but also there for the people who don’t. Anyone can ask us questions, and we are right there ready to answer them.

We offer really good quality products; we’re not necessarily cheap and cheerful seeds because they’re rare so they’re naturally more expensive because of how we have to grow them and source them. But what we try and do as a company with ethics, is some amazing charity work now. We’re working with a charity called Seeds for Growth, and we are really proud to be working with them in supporting people from disadvantaged backgrounds and communities in the UK who are living in social housing. We’re helping the charity to develop green spaces where they can grow their own food, and we’re supporting them by giving them seeds and learning resources and all sorts of things. So we’re really proud to be doing that, and giving everyone a chance to grow their own food.

We’re also working with Suffolk Mind. They’ve got four amazing community allotments where people who are having mental health challenges can go to improve their wellbeing and grow their food. And we’re really proud to be supporting them, too. We see community as a huge thing. It’s everyone and we’re really glad to be there for everyone.

What has been the biggest milestone or proudest moment for She Grows Veg since launching in 2023?

Lucy and I did that small business thing of doing a little dance when we got our first orders through, we couldn’t quite believe it, and that was an unforgettable moment. But I think one of the pinnacles, particularly last year, was exhibiting at the Chelsea Flower Show in our first year, for the first time, and if we look back on it now, we were winging it and applied before we even had any seeds!

We applied in August 2023, and we started selling seeds in November, Chelsea gave us a chance, and we exhibited, and we won gold in our first year, and we had the most incredible reception from all of the visitors, and media coverage and TV coverage, the works, and it put us on the map. It was a very, very exciting time for the business.

You’ve built a team of women who work flexibly around family commitments. Why was this such an important part of your business model, and what impact has it had on your team’s productivity and wellbeing?

To begin with, it was just Lucy and I doing everything. We’re now a team of 13 women, which we’re really, really proud of.

We’ve got people in all kinds of roles, from CEO to seed packers, and we have created a really lovely, flexible, supportive work environment, particularly for women. Most of our seed packers will work around school hours, so they’ll do the school run, they’ll come and pack, and they might not want to work in the holidays, and we support that. So we’ve created this really lovely environment, and we have a very happy workforce, which is fantastic all around.

Looking at the broader picture, what do you think needs to change in the UK startup ecosystem to better support female founders?

There’s a there’s a lot of great organisations we are part of. Female Founders Rise, for example, is superb, and there to boost women and give them the confidence to put themselves out there and to actually say, ‘I’ve got a really good idea’. A lot of this is around education, confidence, boosting and mentoring.

I’m also really passionate about supporting other women myself and I have been throughout my career. I think it’s really important when women are doing great things, that they don’t pull up the ladder behind them, that they help people climb the ladder and both Lucy and I really prioritise this.

We went to a female investors conference run by Female Founders Rise and what was absolutely fascinating is that when women value their company for the purpose of gaining investors, they value the company at 40% less than men. And that is just an indicator of the fact that men sort of go all out and are happy to overreach, whilst women undervalue themselves and their businesses and what they can forecast and achieve. And I think that’s because there are material differences in the psyche between men and women; but it’s also a confidence thing, and particularly for my generation, where women haven’t grown up with equality. I’m 47 and equality has not been part of my career path.

I think the younger generations coming through, the people who are teenagers and maybe young 20s now, actually see men and women as the same. That was not the case at the beginning of my career, that’s for sure. So I think we’re still shaking off a lot of that sort of chauvinism and attitudes to females. I also think we have to support women at different life stages. I’ve got three boys, who are now teenagers, and actually, I now have a lot more capacity, now that my children are older, to do more. We should be supporting women who want to reengage with their careers and give them the confidence to achieve whatever they want to achieve.

As you look ahead to 2025, what’s next for She Grows Veg? Are there any exciting developments, new products, or expansions in the pipeline?

We never stand still and have so many great, really interesting new seed varieties coming down the line. We never stop innovating on that. We’ve just launched a subscription service, so we send people the right seeds at the right time to sow them with all the growing advice on a QR code and that has really taken off very fast. So we’re very excited about that.

We are looking a few years ahead and want to develop a She Grows Veg app and we are looking to grow the business and our gifting range.

We are investing heavily in marketing and we’re looking to double our revenue this year. So there’s a huge push on growing the business and fast.

For women who dream of launching their own businesses but feel held back by self-doubt or systemic barriers, what words of encouragement would you offer?

Our motto is to ‘grow big or go home’, and I think I tell myself that all the time. I think positive affirmations and positive self-talk are really, really important for women in business. You are the only person who can remind yourself that you are absolutely capable of executing anything you want to do.

I talk to myself all the time and say ‘You deserve to be here, your ideas are amazing, look at what you’ve created’. All those positive affirmations are really, really important.

I also think looking for networks like Female Founders Rise or even mentors is really important. Women need sounding boards to just give the reassurance they’re on the right track and they’re doing the right things. So I’d advise building a network of mentors and sounding boards, so you can touch in with people when you need to, to help you make decisions. And have courage in your conviction; if you’ve done the research and see a market opportunity, if you have a strategy and have considered your marketing and your budgeting, then go for it! Let go of imposter syndrome, which, by the way, men also have, they just ignore it more efficiently than us.

It’s important to learn a type of self-discipline to keep yourself positive and keep you driving on and believing in yourself. Then, if you’re having a wobble, touch in with that network, question it, talk about it and get that support.

If you’re even thinking of starting your own business, do the research, make sure your idea is good and sound and it’s what the market wants, think it through, do the planning, do the strategy, and just go for it! If you believe in yourself and back yourself and get good people around you, the chances are you’ll do really, really well.

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