Firebox.com

Operating from Cardiff, the company saw rapid initial growth due to the huge success of Michael and Tom's invention, the Shot Glass Chess Set. In the summer of 1999 the company moved to London and relaunched as Firebox.com.

We spoke with Michael to find out more about the company.

Your name: Michael Smith

Position / title: Co-founder and CEO

Company name: Firebox.com

Website: www.Firebox.com

Your company / website vision statement / goal:

To retail and market the very latest gadgets, games and gifts from around the world.

What you sell / services you offer (brief description of your company):

Firebox is one of the UK's leading multi-channel retailers and specialises in the retail, marketing and manufacture of a highly select range of new and innovative products.

The world is full of boring products... At Firebox we try to do things a little differently. We search high and low for things with a twist. Products that are inspirational, quirky, bizarre and downright fun.

We scour the world looking for the 'next big thing'. The idea being that you'll find products at Firebox long before they make it to the mass market. It is our mission to always be first with the latest hot stuff.

Have you always wanted to run your own business? What were some of your previous jobs / companies?

I had a very brief job when I left University, but Tom Boardman and I always wanted to set up a business together.

Have you got any qualifications? Please tell us about yourself academically?

I have a very unrelevant degree in Geography from Birmingham University.

How / when did the idea of your website / company come about?

Well Tom and I were at University together and we were very keen to set up a business, we just didn’t know in what area. We wanted to do something that was personally interesting to both of us, something that was a hobby, a passion or an interest.

We use to spend a lot of time reading the men’s and gadget magazines like Stuff, T3, FHM, Maxim etc. We noticed a lot of them had gadget pages in them but there was no dominant UK retailers’ getting their details mentioned in the gadget pages.

We thought it would be good idea to set up our own business selling these unusual and exciting products directly to people of our age group. So that was the starting point.

If you could give readers of this book one piece of advice what would it be?

The main piece of advice I can give is: The hardest step is just setting up in the first place. So many people procrastinate and have ideas for businesses but never actually get around to doing it.

So the single piece of advice is, if you’ve got and idea and are convinced in it, just take that first step and actually get started.

Everything else just seems to fall into place after that.

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