Sip by sip: Lee Sutherland’s journey to small business growth

From sourcing ingredients for her organic herbal tea company Little Wildling Co to scaling the business, Lee’s journey is a testament to resilience and determination of small business owners across Australia.

Follow Lee on Instagram @littlewildlingco.

"Small-business owners are ballsy, headstrong, fearless, creative & brave."

- Lee Sutherland, Little Wildling Co
 

Welcome Lee. Thanks so much for joining us. So tell us – what is Little Wildling Co? 

Thanks! Little Wildling Co is an Australian organic herbal tea company, servicing cafes, restaurants, hotels, hairdressers, yoga studios and retail stores across Australia. The products are also available through Little Wildling Co’s online store, offering loose-leaf tea, powders like Matcha Mint, Turmeric Latte, Dirty Dandy Chai and plastic free, home compostable tea bags. We're B Corp Certified, so keeping everything plastic free and sustainability minded is important to us.

When did you first launch the business? 

So I launched Little Wildling Co about seven years ago, but it’s only become more active in the last couple of years. It's always been a side-hustle to my main talent management business, frankie+jet, so there’s a lot to juggle. Outside my businesses I’m also a mum to two gorgeous kids and as many fur babies, chooks and ducks as my husband Shaun will let me [laughs].  

Do you have any employees to help you out?  

Within Little Wildling Co I'm the only full-time person, and then I have a part-time employee that mostly helps out with order management and contractors. Then I’ve also got an external accountant and a bookkeeper, plus staff over at frankie+jet.   

What do you love most about your business? 

I love that it gives me the flexibility to work on my terms, my hours. That the more I work, the more revenue I can make, the more people we can help. I love that it's creative, and I can wear all the hats from creative director to marketing and operations and everything in-between. I love that it's challenging (because selling tea online is hard), so it’s never boring and straightforward.

And what would you say you dislike most about your business? 

All of the things I just said [laughs]. Probably that you get so passionate about your business (because it’s your baby) that you overwork and burnout.  The quiet times are tough obviously, and it can get lonely doing everything on your own. Also not having the capabilities to do everything the way you want because of cashflow or staffing. And just not having enough time. 

Did you always know you were going to have your own business?  

So I grew up on a wheat and sheep farm in country Western Australia. Growing up, I don’t think I ever really thought of my parents as entrepreneurs. Even though they’re incredible business owners that were able to successfully run a farm in very trying conditions, I never really thought of them like that until later in life. And they were hard workers. I've always been a really, really hard worker. So whenever I've worked full-time in a different company structure, I've always worked my *** off. So I guess it made sense to run my own business. There’s more to gain doing it for yourself and just has always happened naturally and without being planned in most cases.  

Looking back, how long would you say it took you to launch your business after landing on the idea? 

Not that long because I work very fast and I don't really think things through clearly like a normal person would [laughs]. I knew I wanted to offer a physical product, and it took a little while to work out what that would be. Like is it raw chocolate, lip balms etc. I settled on teas as I was already making my own because I couldn’t find blends that I liked. And with my background in natural health science, it just made sense. I settled on a business name, had the visuals and the vibe that I wanted to do, and I just put everything into action within a couple of months. By the time I had packaging and final designs it was probably less than six months, but it felt very fast.

What stopped you from starting sooner?

Probably the knowledge of where to get ingredients from, sourcing packaging, things like that. Also you have to teach yourself everything. There wasn’t any handholding on suppliers, packaging, labelling laws, ingredients etc, so spending time working out that was probably the hardest.

So you mentioned you have another business – can you tell us a little more about that?  

I do. I have a talent management agency frankie+jet, where we have a few full-time staff. We represent talent and experts in their field all over Australia – like TV/media personalities, nutritionists, interior designers. Then we have our influencer arm of the agency as well, so representing those with highly engaged communities on TikTok, Instagram etc. But they’re always an expert in their field whether it be on parenting, health, media etc.    

I also have another lifestyle, health, business and sustainability blog called This Wildling Life, which is an evolution of my first wellness company that used to be called Fitness in the City.   

Follow frankie+jet on Facebook and Instagram, Little Wildling Co teas @littlewildlingco and This Little Wildling Life on Facebook and Instagram.  

Do you have more business ideas you haven’t acted on? 

Yes, I have many business ideas [laughs]. It’s something I often have to talk myself out of actioning because I’ve got all the ideas and it’s something I love doing. That initial startup of the creative concept and just getting it out there in the world.  

What are some traits you think best describe a small business owner? 

• Ballsy 
• Headstrong 
• Fearless 
• Creative 
• Brave 

Do you think imposter syndrome a challenge for small business owners? 

I think impostor syndrome is the biggest thing that holds all business owners back. Even as you get more successful. I remember back in the day how excited I got for my first online sale. But then the benchmark keeps moving, so then it was the first wholesaler. And then it's like, OK, what’s next? You never think it’s good enough. You just keep raising the bar and comparing to other people and things like that. So yeah, imposter syndrome is a real challenge.   

When you first launched, what did you find most challenging? 

I think brand awareness. I was really confident from the get-go in my product and brand. I had a clear brand voice, great organic ingredients and premium packaging. I also had a good return customer base, so I felt that was my stamp of approval to keep going. But knowing how much digital marketing to do on Facebook and Google ads, and that side of things. Because just because you’ve built it doesn’t mean the customers will come. So getting brand awareness out there is tough, and it’s still a challenge today.  

Now your business is more mature, what do you find most challenging? 

Cash flow is definitely my biggest struggle, because the more you grow, the more stock you need to purchase, the more warehouse space you need, the more staff you need and so on. It’s a continuous cycle of juggling money coming in and out and ensuring everything gets paid on time. Also simple things like inventory tracking. As a lean team, it's hard to keep on top of that side sometimes.

What’s your proudest business moment to-date?

Oh, I've had a few. But the collaboration with [skincare brand] Clarins was amazing.  They approached us to create an exclusive tea blend to be sold with their best-selling serum that was sold online, and at David Jones and Myer. So we did beautiful new packaging, a new photoshoot – the lot. It was a really amazing collaboration.

Also when I was house hunting and saw my tea in some people’s houses – that was very cool.

What’s keeping you up at night? 

Getting people in to help pack tea and orders is great, but that's not money generating. What I need is someone who's either an expert in the digital marketing side of things to help increase our footprint, or someone in sales and distribution, and that's their jam. I just think anything to help increase eyeballs a little bit more. With growth comes cashflow challenges to scale the warehouse, our inventory, staff etc. So scaling, managing cashflow and not having enough time are the big ones.   

What’s the next big business milestone you’d like to hit? 

A bigger warehouse space primarily, and then we’re about to launch a new teabag of our Dirty Dandy Chai blend. Then it’s things like updating the website, organising new photoshoots etc. Getting experts on board to look at the website – that type of thing. 

What’s the one thing that’d really help you in your business right now? 

Someone else running it for me [laughs]. But really, that expert help or mentor. Someone that’s already done it that I can learn from. Because the business has so much potential, and I feel the only thing hindering it at this stage is not knowing what I don't know. 

 Where do you currently go for advice on managing your business? 

Just friends who have businesses. I guess that are on similar levels or a little bit higher. And podcasts. I do a lot of business podcasts. Some of my favourites are The Female Founder and How I Built This with Guy Raz Wondery. I like ones that are honest and really disclose their failures and successes, and get into the detail like I’m using this app in Shopify for XY or this is what we’re doing for staffing.  

What’s your top tip for other aspiring or current small business owners?

Not to look outside at other people too much. I think there's a big facade that everyone is doing better than what you're doing, or other people know more than what you know. But the truth is, no matter how many years people are in business, they're still finding their feet and they're still making it up as they go. Even if they're a really big company, bringing in millions and millions a year, they've still got their own struggles that they’re dealing with. So I think it's not comparing and looking around. Because no one really knows what they're doing, until they do.