Creativity and business don’t mix, right? Wrong. There’s absolutely no reason why creatives can’t become a financial and commercial success - and the School for Creative Startups is one way of turnng your brilliant idea into a business that makes you money. Founded by former Dragon’s Den investor, serial entrepreneur and financial force of nature Doug Richard, the school takes creatives back to basics when it comes to business know-how, with courses on everything from negotiation and cash flow to social media and marketing. We found out more about the game-changing school from the programme’s Creative Director, Medeia Cohan.

WHAT’S THE SCHOOL FOR CREATIVE STARTUPS ALL ABOUT?
School for Creative Startups is my answer to the knowledge gap that occurs in art and design schools in this and many other countries , which means that creatives aren’t being taught the skills to live from what they make or do. The course is a part- time year-long interactive and hands-on course delivering all the business know-how that creative people need to build sustainable startups, without all the technical gibberish, pesky acronyms and theoretical rhetoric. It’s just the stuff you need to grow your own successful startup – taught the way you like to learn it.

WHO’S THE PROGRAMME FOR?
Any creative person, or team of people, who have an idea for a creative business, or already have a creative startup, and want to improve their business skills and grow their startup into a long-term success. We consider the creative industry to be a broad sector, which includes areas such as broadcast media, communications, craft, culinary arts, design, digital, fashion, fine art, music and the performing arts.

WHAT TYPE OF BUSINESSES HAVE TAKEN PART IN THE PAST?
We’ve had everyone from fashion designers to web developers and a few folks that might surprise you like a magician and a perfumer. We’ve had mums who are maternity leave who don’t want to go back and people who’ve been made redundant and now want to pursue their dreams. We’ve had young folks, old folks, people changing direction and people starting again. We even have a girl who comes over from Dubai each month for class. The bottom line is that if you have a brilliant creative business idea – and need help getting it off the ground – this is a great support and training programme for you.

HOW CAN I GET INVOLVED?
It’s easy enough. All you need to do is visit our website and click on apply now. The application is a bit long, but it’s really rather friendly and if you know what you want to do, it shouldn’t be too hard to complete. If you’re not ready to apply just yet and you’d like to learn more, you can sign up to our monthly newsletter or follow us on Meetup to get details on free upcoming information events.

THIS MUST BE REALLY EXPENSIVE RIGHT?
We understand that people starting businesses tend to be cash poor, but since we can’t charge nothing for what we do, we try to be as accommodating as possible. To that end we offer two different tuition rates: Our full tuition rate is £3,500 but we also offer scholarships at a reduced rate of £1,00 for those who make a strong case for support in their application. To make life even easier, we also offer monthly payment plans.

WE’RE TOLD THAT WOMEN ARE RISK-AVERSE AND NOT ASSERTIVE ENOUGH. HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT FEMALE ENTREPRENEURSHIP?
I don’t know what the rest of the world is like, but the creative sector tends to be women-led. In fact around three-quarters of our students are female and they seem pretty savvy and skilful to me. I think all creative people – male or female – suffer from a lack of confidence when it comes to business and that manifests itself in funny ways. It’s hard to take big risks or be assertive when you don’t know what you’re doing – perhaps women just recognise that fact sooner than men.

THERE’S A RECESSION ON – IS NOW REALLY A GOOD TIME TO SET UP A BUSINESS?
Absolutely! There has never been a better time to start a business than right now and there is nowhere better in the world than the UK to start your business in. There are more amazing tax incentives, loan programmes and training schemes available now in the UK then anywhere. Programmes like Launcher which offers loans to people under the age of 30 enabling them start up new businesses, or the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme which help make startups more attractive investments for Angels; these are just some of the many ways that this country is making it easier to access capital.

  All Press Articles