‘Fairy doors are not a toy. They’re an experience’

A vivid imagination has made magic happen at the Irish Fairy Door Company, which has clocked up sales of more than 150,000 doors in just two years.

What is special about your business? We have created a product that has captured the imagination of children and adults alike. The doors are aimed at the age group that believe in Santa and the kids are absolutely thrilled when they discover their fairy has "moved in" while they were asleep.

What sets your business apart in your sector? The fairy doors are not a toy. They're an experience, as the child has to get involved with their fairy, register his or her name and sign up to the "rules" of fairy keeping.

Every Friday, the child receives an update from Queen Kate in fairyland and this requires them to do something in relation to their fairy.

It’s this interactivity that sets us apart. One of the fairy’s jobs is to protect children from bad dreams, and parents are finding this very helpful.

What has been your biggest challenge? Coping with the fact that the business took off so fast. We started up in 2013 and now have 20 employees and have sold more than 150,000 doors. It was also a challenge to start a business with very little money – €8,500 which my Mum generously gave us from the money she had saved by giving up smoking.

What has been your biggest success? On a personal level, producing a product that is heartwarming, makes people smile and helps create genuinely happy family moments. On a business level, getting a 97-second slot on the Late Late Toy Show last year. Sales sky rocketed after that.

We’re also proud that the doors are being made in Ireland and of the success of our social media campaign prior to launch. It worked really well and we had 50 orders in the first 24 hours. We set out to make a gender-neutral product and are pleased that the doors are a success with boys and girls alike.

What key piece of advice would you give to someone starting a business? Find like-minded people to work with who believe as passionately as you do in what you're doing and who bring different skills. Myself and my best friend, Aoife Lawler, came up with the idea for the business in the first place and then our husbands, who had both found themselves unemployed due to the recession, joined us.

Aoife and I are the creative force behind the company while the boys, who both have business backgrounds, run things day to day. The combination works very well.

Who do you admire most in business and why? Self-made billionaire, Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook, the first female to have served on its board.

We met her last year and she is very impressive. She is a big promoter of gender equality in the home and in the workplace.

What two things could the Government do to help SMEs in the current environment? Reduce employer's PRSI and change the VAT bands on toys to address products like ours that don't fall into existing categories.

Educational toys enjoy a lower rate of VAT, but we are being levied at the higher rate because we’ve been classified as an “ordinary” toy even though we’re not.

In your experience, are the banks lending to SMEs currently? Yes, but you have to fight your corner very hard. My husband has a financial services background so he knows the lending business and he can talk the talk. But I pity anyone who can't [do that] in the current climate. It must be very daunting. We have just received high potential start-up funding from Enterprise Ireland that we had to match. We've done it but it was a long haul.

What's the biggest mistake you've made in business? It's not so much a mistake as a lack of skills. None of us had experience of running a business on this scale or dealing with a team of 20 people, so it has been a real challenge to get the HR side of things right.

What is the most frustrating part of running a small business? Going into a shop and seeing your product just thrown on a shelf and not properly displayed. You wonder why the people don't make the effort when they've already paid for the stock. Surely they want to sell it?

The good thing now is that we’ve reached a size where we have people to go out and make sure the product is being displayed right. If not, we will take it back.

What's your business worth and would you sell it? It's really too soon to put a value on it as we're just getting going. But in five or six years time if Disney, or Hasbro or Mattel came calling with a nice big cheque, we'd certainly think about it.