Never underestimate drunken advice

Like most new business owners, Pearce was brimming with vim and vigour when he launched his venture in 2004. Professional Conferencing Service was his intended route to riches - a conference-calling system that charged users only the price of a local call...

The moments that made millions: Business successes tell us the secrets to their fortunes

One moment can change everything. Sure, there’s little doubt that a solid business plan, a dollop of steely resolve and triple-checked figures will all help your chances of success in today’s cut-throat, ever-unpredictable business world. However, there’s a lot to be said for the intervention of fate and its resulting impact upon the bottom line, otherwise we’d all just follow those self-help business bestsellers to a ‘better, richer’ us.

But how exactly do you make Mistress Fate work for you? Always in search of business inspiration, we spoke to five of Britain’s most successful entrepreneurs, men who started with nothing and ended with… well, a lot more than us, to find out the magic moments that turned them towards a fortune. Sure, they come in the form of a bathroom-based brainwave, some sage advice from an inebriated stranger and even a shotgun attack by a pair of Mexican banditos (yes, really), but this is no mere luck – there are lessons to be learned. Notebooks out…

• Never Underestimate drunken advice - Andy Pearce, founder, Powwownow

Like most new business owners, Pearce was brimming with vim and vigour when he launched his venture in 2004. Professional Conferencing Service was his intended route to riches – a conference calling system that charged users only the price of a local call, rather than the usual astronomical fees.

But within 10 months, his enthusiasm was taking a battering, thanks to a poor take-up. “I just couldn’t get it off the ground,” the London-based businessman says. “I’d invested heavily in the business and while the idea was – and still is – sound, the office managers I was targeting just weren’t using us.” Pearce (below) turned to networking events in an effort to promote his service, but found that even there, few were interested. The business seemed destined to follow the majority of start-ups into the scrap heap within its first year of trading.

“I found myself plonked next to this stranger at one of these networking dos,” says Pearce. “I’d had quite a few drinks, and I just sat there, and told him all about my bleak prospects. I guess I was expecting a bit of sympathy, but the chap – despite his equally drunken state – actually started talking sense.” The stranger advised him to change the name of the business into something more memorable and funky, and to use quirky marketing tactics to appeal to his target audience.

The next morning, Pearce did just that. He filed the new name of Powwownow (as in: have a pow-wow, now) at Companies House and began dreaming up creative PR stunts. “We gave away free hands-free kits at railway stations that were really giant elastic bands to attach your phone to your head, and commissioned press-friendly research such as ‘how often men think about sex when they’re in the office’.”
A series of viral campaigns followed, and today the business has built a reputation for irreverent marketing. Thanks solely to one piece of advice proffered by a sozzled stranger, Powwownow now has a £5m turnover.