Getting through the pain barrier to run a business

Hazel Barry Owner of H2K at their shop in Harrogate

Hazel Barry is one determined woman.

She has faced the prospect of bankruptcy, losing the ability to walk for a year and juggling running a successful international business.

“I find it really hard to stop,” she admits. Hazel, 38, has – despite numerous setbacks – built up a beauty business with global appeal. From its base in Harrogate. H2K sells luxury skincare, toiletries and spa products to hotels here, in the Middle East, Australia and in Europe and has just opened its first High Street shop, in Harrogate of course.

Hazel grew up in Bradford and showed entrepreneurial flair from an early age.

When she was seven she sold rose petal perfume she’d made round the neighbourhood. She left school at 16 and, on her mum’s orders, went to secretarial school for six months. “My mum said if I was going to live at home I had to find a proper job,” recalls Hazel. “I remember thinking at the time, I’m not going be a secretary, I’m going to have one.”

Determined Hazel embarked on a business degree funded by the chemicals company Cytec where she worked in customer services admin, before moving on to an export manager’s role where she learnt about global trade.

At the age of 21, a Prince’s Trust business course had propelled Hazel into setting up her own fashion business.

“I had three girls working for me making clothes for businesswomen. I really enjoyed it but it wasn’t bringing in enough money so I decided to type during the day and sell at night. It seemed like a cracking idea and doubled my money but, because of the workload, I got tendonitis and couldn’t move my hand so I had to stop.”

This commitment to hard work continues today though as she balances the life of a mother with that of a businesswoman.

“I don’t think anyone who has a business works less than 12 hour days. I’ve got a nice work life balance now because I’ve got a little girl. I work from nine till two, then go back to work after seven when my daughter goes to sleep.”

After three years as the northern sales rep for a South East based cosmetics firm she missed running her own business.

“I found I really missed doing things for myself. I set up a business to sell various things for the hotel industry and I’d been contacted by a company asking me if I could sell pens and pencils into the Lowry. Although they weren’t my thing I did it anyway and got the order.” The Lowry was the only five-star hotel in the North of England at the time.

“At the end of the meeting the Lowry guy asked me if I sold toiletries. I didn’t but I said I did. ” The original concept for the company evolved from Hazel’s plans to manufacture skincare products to help people with problem skin.

“I have a rare condition which means I suffer from inflammation of different parts of my body. When I was a teenager it was my skin.

“I couldn’t find anything to help it until I found Kalahari melon oil which comes from Namibia and is really good as a natural moisturising derivative.”

Initially the business traded out of a ‘tiny bungalow’ on a trading estate in Bradford with a team of one.

“It was just me for three years really. I used to get up at five, fill bottles until seven, and then get out on the road to do deliveries and then back to do my accounts.” While many start-ups fail because they struggle to find a market to sell to, Hazel’s challenge was the opposite problem – she sold too much. “I was trading too fast. So I was buying more stock but people weren’t paying quickly enough. For six months I had to fax the bank every Friday and then on a Monday to find out if I was going bust. I could hardly sleep at night.

“I did consider getting out but I was in too deep, and failure wasn’t an option.”

She sold her house and moved back with her mother. For the next six years she slowly but surely re-established the business, this time with a small team.

The firm then cracked the Middle East market which acted as a stepping stone into Australia.

But then came the economic downturn and although they lost a major client in Dubai, they survived and began moving along briskly until a health problem threatened to stop Hazel in her tracks.

Then, two and half years ago Hazel collapsed at  home and was unable to  get up.

An inflamed pelvis related to her medical condition had caused the problem.

She was unable to stand or even sit and was told by doctors that if she couldn’t overcome the pain of learning to walk again in the first two years, she’d probably never walk again.

“I needed 24-hour care for six months and couldn’t walk for a year. I couldn’t even use a wheelchair as I couldn’t sit upright,” says Hazel, whose daughter Iris was two at the time.

“It was horrendous running the business but I moved the phone line and PC downstairs. I was still able to talk and type. I had to get a taxi to take Iris to nursery as I couldn’t drive. My mum and partner Mark were a great help too.”

She also employed a sales director. Looking back she says her illness had a positive effect, adding: “Not being able to walk and get out and do things made me for the first time in my life stop. It made me stop and sit back from the business. It made me jump out of it and see it in a different light. That’s been fantastic.

“We’ve been able to rebrand, I’ve bought a new product range in and I also wrote a business plan for the next five years.”

With her tenacity, there’s little doubt that she’ll not only get there, but make a success of potentially a hugely lucrative market.

Heading across the atlantic

The name H2K comes from H2O for water and K for Kalahari after the melon oil which is the main ingredient in the skincare products.

It recently rebranded after the company missed out on what had been considered a shoe-in contract worth £500,000.

“We asked them why and they told us it was because we weren’t English enough,”says founder Hazel Barry. “We have our address on there but they said it’s not on the front of the bottle. So we rebranded as H2K of Harrogate and since then the business is virtually doubling.

“Being British globally is fantastic. We supply to the Middle East through a distributor in Dubai and since rebranding in December they’ve doubled the amount of business they put with us because the Middle East market really likes the fact that it says Harrogate on the front of the bottle.”

This year will be busy for H2K as they intend to launch in America.