How Lick paint went from lockdown setback to success
The founders of eco-friendly paint company have built a multimillion-pound business thanks to a customer-centric approach
Lucas London's top tips for business success
Have a direct conversation with your customer base: listen to and speak to them, through social media and a customer-centric team. In Lick’s case, this is the decorator success team, made up of colour specialists whose job is to support the decorators.
Take customer feedback on board: London understands that customers will show you what’s working through what they are buying, and Lick changes their ranges depending on what’s selling. They speak to groups on Facebook, too, who provide a direct opinion, and this then impacts their product ranges.
Create a community: And he is quick to remind any business that their community should feel like they are part of the company, because any business is just a combination of customers. That’s why Lick did a crowdfunding round on equity crowdfunding site Seedrs so that the Lick community could become shareholders in the business if they so desired.
Lucas London has always been comfortable with failure. And throughout his career, the possibility of failure has never been far.
In his twenties, London left a role in a hedge fund to work at a start-up that only too quickly went into administration. Then in March 2020, he launched his latest venture, Lick – an innovative and eco-friendly online paint company – the very same day that the UK went into lockdown.
“Most positive things in my life have come through failure. If I were concerned with it, I wouldn’t have followed this path,” he admits.
This willingness to take risks has paid off: just eight months after launching, Lick has grown from zero to half a million pounds in monthly revenue and will soon expand into Europe and bricks-and-mortar retail.
Identifying an opportunity
London and his business partner Sam Bradley (who met while working at Airtasker) launched Lick in the belief that the home decorating and paint industry was ripe for disruption. They could see that too many customers felt unsupported in the process of shopping for paint.
“The offline experience was frustrating: there was too much colour choice and product choice; no guidance on how to decorate rooms if they faced north or south, and no brand that resonated with a mass demographic,” says London.
“We saw a unique opportunity to disrupt, bringing the experience online and improving customer experience.”
“We saw a unique opportunity to disrupt, bringing the experience online and improving customer experience”
The pair started working on their idea in July 2019, and raised £850,000 in investment before launching.
Placing a premium on customer support
Lick’s mission is to support customers through education and inspiration.
They employ colour specialists to offer support on site or via video call, and create educational content on social media and throughout the user journey so customers feel confident in the process of transforming their home.
Lick’s social channels focus on community, showing the changes that people have made to their homes and providing inspiration for future decorators.
“We celebrate their transformations,” says London, who describes the business as being “obsessed” by home decorators and their needs. He loves to see how creative customers can be with their homes, including confidence to use pinks, teals and greens, as well as using panelling and painting ceilings.
Offering Clearpay is another customer-centric initiative, says London.
“We want to give them every tool to purchase and it’s a key payment platform that [our customers] use. We want to give flexibility and [Clearpay] allows customers to choose the best payment method for them.”
“We want to give flexibility and Clearpay allows customers to choose the best payment method for them.”
He says that while paint in itself is a relatively cost-effective way of creating impact – with the average room costing less than £100 including decorating equipment from Lick – he wants to support customers with all payment options. This is particularly important if customers are in the midst of a bigger and costlier renovation project.
An eco-friendly choice
Lick has built sustainability into its core mission. The business has planted the equivalent of 80 football pitches of trees, and partners with charities that have fished 150,000 plastic bottles out of the ocean.
“It’s something we’re hugely proud of; it’s core to our business and correlated to growth, so having a positive impact is part of our foundation,” he says.
Lick uses recycled packaging, a localised supply chain and is constantly working to make the business more sustainable. For example, its paint brushes, previously made from wood, are now made from bamboo.
Launching during COVID-19
As for launching on the day the UK went into its first lockdown in March 2020? For Lick the timing offered both huge disadvantages and advantages.
“There were massive challenges to building our supply chain during COVID-19,” London says. “There were increased shipping prices; we had to build the business remotely and rebuild our supply chain.”
But it soon became clear that there were positives, too. “We were working in a period of unknown and before launch we sent an email to our investors saying we’d hold back on marketing until there was more certainty in the market,” London remembers. “But we very quickly understood there was a thirst from people to decorate.”
“Zoom has let lots of people into our homes and [they’ve] become a representation of ourselves, like fashion,” he says. “People previously spent huge amounts of time away from home, but now it’s seen as a place of security and protection.”
The direct-to-consumer home décor brand brought forward its seed round of investment, led by digital-lifestyle focused venture capital firm Felix Capital, raising £3m just three months after launch.
Once the business was making half a million pounds a month, London made the decision to switch off all marketing and focus on rebuilding the supply chain for greater growth.
Lick is starting to grow again: it’s now a business of 40 people and will launch online in Europe in October 2021. Bricks-and-mortar stores will start opening next year, and it hopes to be the largest global home décor brand in three to five years.
“The Lick community support each other with inspiration and guidance.”
As the company scales, London will keep customers at the forefront of the business. “Lick is a community of decorators,” he says. “We are focused on supporting them [as they] transform their homes, and the [Lick} community support each other with inspiration and guidance.”
Tips
Have a direct conversation with your customer base: listen to and speak to them, through social media and a customer-centric team. In Lick’s case, this is the decorator success team, made up of colour specialists whose job is to support the decorators.
Take customer feedback on board: London understands that customers will show you what’s working through what they are buying, and Lick changes their ranges depending on what’s selling. They speak to groups on Facebook, too, who provide a direct opinion, and this then impacts their product ranges.
Create a community: And he is quick to remind any business that their community should feel like they are part of the company, because any business is just a combination of customers. That’s why Lick did a crowdfunding round on equity crowdfunding site Seedrs so that the Lick community could become shareholders in the business if they so desired.
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