Business Birthday Interview: Lizbeth Holstein, Honey Tree Bespoke

As Honey Tree Bespoke, the bespoke online stationery company, celebrates its 2nd birthday, we catch up with Lizbeth Holstein, it's creative director and co-founder, to talk about the business and her working life.

We'll be celebrating Honey Tree Bespoke's 2nd birthday by… thanking our shoppers, who we are offering a free Limited edition print (of the shoppers' choice) with all orders over £200 between 25th November and 19th December (last shopping day for UK orders.)

The best moment of last year was… the launch day of our new personalised charity Christmas cards. Our first order was for 600 of them, bound for Russia - don't you just love the worldwide web?!

The worst moment of last year was… Missing our deadline for the launch of our version two website (thanks to our web builders.) It happened at the same time that our first catalogue went to over 70,000 shoppers featuring some products that they couldn't purchase - it was only a fortnight but it felt longer.

I couldn't live without… Google and coffee.

My average day involves… viewing the previous evening's orders, feedback forms and enquiries, co-ordinating with the print team and working on new products and designs (in particular our 2012 wedding boutique.)

The websites that I find particularly useful to our business are… Amazon (we constantly monitor how they engage with shoppers) and Flickr as I love sharing artworks and images.

My advice to anyone thinking of starting up a business is that… it's like renovating a property: you have to have a clear vision of the business in a year's time plus double the expense budget that you initially anticipated. This helps as it will make you think on a bigger scale and never compromise on your offering.

If money were no object, I would buy… a conservation game farm in South Africa.

My most overused phrase is… "has anyone seen my glasses?"

You might not know this, but… I can only drink organic wine!!

The best piece of advice I've ever been given came from… my mother, who is Dutch and said, "the more you do the more you can do."

My pet hate is… as print-on-demand short-run printers, I cringe when I hear that major greeting card suppliers have run out of stock. Poor customer service is another pet hate.

I admire… Chrissy Rucker (Founder of the White company) who has created an amazing business with four children in tow.

My worst business trait is… expecting all around me to see what I have conceptualised without explaining it fully.

My best is… not being restrained by detail and always focusing on the end product and working back from there.

29th November 2011