About this episode

Emma Burke shares her journey of creating Laceeze, a brand born from a simple solution to a common problem in children's sports.

Emma Burke didn't set out to start a business. She was standing on the sidelines of her son's football training in the wind and the rain when a parent looped an elastic band around a boy's boots so his laces would stop coming undone. Everyone else's kids retied their laces three, four, five times a game. His didn't. That was the moment Laceeze was born. Summary This is a founder story about turning a problem nobody was searching for into a brand sold around the world. Emma had trained as a vet nurse on £80 a week, then built a 60-person contract cleaning company she quietly dreaded, before spotting that elastic-band trick on the touchline. She didn't invent it. She saw it work, asked the parents and the kids whether they'd buy and wear a proper version, and took the answer to market. Laceeze launched in 2017 at £6 and is still going today. She and Matt get into the marketing problem most product founders never see coming, which is customers who don't yet know they need you. Emma explains how she built the UK with no marketing budget through an ambassador programme, why selling to an audience of children means treating safeguarding seriously, and how being honest on social media…

People in this episode

Host: Matt Edmundson

Guest: Emma Burke

Topics covered

• founder story
• entrepreneurship
• marketing strategy
• product development
• brand building

Keywords

• Laceeze
• entrepreneurship
• marketing
• brand building
• children's products
• safeguarding
• social media trust

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Laceeze

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