Business Chit Chat thread

This is the opinion of a billionaire, dismissing environmental protections for our nature and heritage that were hard fought. We have issues to fix but this article just demonstrates that he doesnt actually understand the Irish legislation or policies that he's complaining about.

And anyway the lastest Irish Times article on the govt response to Collisons musings shows it was all prompted by Micheal Martin and Simon Harris, to test how the public might react, and to give them something to react to to bring in changes.

Save us from billionaires interfering in our politics, it tends not to work out too well...

Hi everyone,

I’m new to self-employed business ownership and currently in the process of learning the fundamentals — from setting up small ventures to understanding the financial side of running and owning businesses.

I’d love some advice from people who’ve already gone down this path:

• Where did you find good communities or networks (online or in-person) to connect with others who are self-employed or building small businesses?
• Are there any Irish-based groups, meetups, or forums that helped you in the early stages?
• Anything you wish you’d known when first starting out?

Thanks in advance — I really value hearing from people with firsthand experience.

Cheers

The 'young irishman' also has vested interests....

In early 2021, an Irish ecommerce outfit (Sasity Limited t/a fitpinkfitness.com) appeared on a Spark crowdfunding platform, promising the usual online-retail nirvana: booming sales, exploding margins, and world domination via brightly-coloured leggings (made in China - guaranteed Irish wha!). Investors were told the company had already chalked up €470k turnover and €70k profit in its first full year of 2020 [unbelievable figures!], and was “on course” for €1.2m in 2021, the year of the fundraiser.

Duly impressed, crowdfunders stumped up €356k, which obligingly appeared as share premium in the 2021 accounts. Pink champagne all round.

The reality, as quietly documented in the Companies Registration Office filings, has been somewhat less glamorous.

Losing streak

Despite the glowing pitch, the fledgling fashionistas (mother and daughter duo Jenni Timony and Jasmine Kennedy) immediately began clocking up losses. The micro-entity accounts (helpfully free of awkward details like turnover, VAT or director salaries) record:

2021: -€205k (crowdfunding year - where did the €1.2m promised in June 2021 go?)

2022: -€191k

2023: still negative

2024: -€98k

By 31 December 2024, the accumulated deficit had reached -€431k. Which is at least a number beginning with four hundred thousand, just not the direction investors were promised.

Beg & Borrow

Despite Enterprise Ireland programme manager, Jenni, receiving startup funds from Enterprise Ireland via the Donegal LEO in 2020, profits were refusing to appear. Luckily the crowdfunding bounty of 2021 was able to cushion some of the -€205k loss that year. Then the company turned to the traditional “serial entrepreneur” survival strategy — borrow money. Next up was an unlucky punter called Jack Arthur who lumped in €25k in 2022.

By 2024, filings show:

• Bank loan: €189,470
• Hire purchase / finance leases: €60,528
• Director current accounts: €19,115

To the untrained eye, that looks rather like a retailer living on credit. To the trained eye, it looks exactly like the same thing.

The balance sheet now shows net liabilities of -€50k. That’s “balance sheet insolvent” to professionals, and “time for another pitch deck” to optimists.

The micro-entity magic trick

Like many plucky startups, the company files micro-entity accounts, allowing it to omit such minor details as:

• Sales
• VAT
• Payroll
• Marketing costs
• Cashflow
• The meaning of life

Investors hoping to discover how the stated €470k → €1.2m revenue trajectory actually went will, alas, find only total assets and total liabilities, a useful summary if you’re an actuary, less so if you’re curious where the money went.

The eye-watering question

Crowdfunding “investors” (the people who believed the numbers on the pitch deck rather than the numbers on the balance sheet) could be forgiven for scratching their heads.

After all, they were told:

• €470k turnover
• €70k profit
• €1.2m projected sales by 2022 and €10m by end of 2025

Yet the only figures available in cold, hard CRO filings reveal:

• No published revenue at all
• Losses every single year since the raise
• A steadily growing pile of debt to keep the lights on

Perhaps the difference between “turnover” and “left over” could have been explained somewhere in the micro-entity notes, if such notes existed.

Current mood

As of the latest filings, the business is still officially a “going concern”, which means:

• The equity capital is gone
• The losses exceed the investment
• The liabilities exceed the assets
• The debt needs feeding

Anyone think it can avoid the fate of the Director’s last 2 ventures?

https://www.solocheck.ie/Irish-Company/Frankleyweb-Limited-486276

https://www.solocheck.ie/Irish-Company/Doolittles-Donegal-Limited-488936

Sources:

https://www.thephoenix.ie/article/jenni-timonys-sales-pitch/

https://thecurrency.news/articles/53147/were-two-years-ahead-of-where-wed-hope-to-be-before-the-pandemic-hit/

https://www.sparkventurefunding.com/campaign/fitpink

@fitpink75 what exactly is all that supposed to be leading to? Smacks of AI.