£3M, £2M, £1M — Three Businesses, One Better Question

Picture the scene

When I first met the Managing Director of this food retail business, he approached me after my “Get BIG or Go Home” keynote with a straightforward question:

“How do I get to a Million?”

My immediate response was, “Why do you want to reach a million?”

THE SITUATION

Costa and his brother were running two food retail outlets on the outskirts of the city. Between them, they were working sixty, seventy, sometimes ninety hours a week, generating around £650,000 in turnover. Profits were mediocre at best. Their plan was straightforward: open a third outlet, hit a million, then sell before the market turned on them.

On the surface, it looked like a growth strategy. In practice, it was an exit plan dressed up as ambition.

But as we talked, something else emerged. Behind the exhaustion and the frustration with the industry’s reputation was a man who genuinely loved what he did, and who quietly believed the takeaway industry could be something the public respected rather than dismissed. He had a wife and young family he rarely saw. A passion for sport. And a dream, serious enough to say out loud, of one day being involved in the Olympics.

He wasn’t just trying to build a business. He was trying to build a life he hadn’t yet given himself permission to want.

THE CHALLENGE

The numbers told a different story from the one Costa had been telling himself.

When we sat down and modelled the reality of opening a third outlet, the picture shifted considerably. Additional overheads, staffing uncertainty, and capital investment. To make the third site viable and hit the financial targets he had in mind, the business would need to be generating closer to £2 million, not £1 million. The path he was on was longer, riskier, and less aligned with what he actually wanted than he’d realised.

The million wasn’t the problem. The reason behind the million was.

He didn’t want a bigger version of what he already had. He wanted out of the grind. He wanted the family time, the sport, the freedom, the chance to change how people thought about his industry. The third outlet, as originally conceived, would have delivered none of those things. It would simply have added a third site to manage and a third reason to work another ninety-hour week.

THE TURNING POINT

The question we kept coming back to wasn’t “How do I grow?” It was “What am I actually trying to build, and for whom?“

Once Costa had a clear answer to that, everything changed. The goal stopped being a number and became a life. And the strategy had to change to match it.

THE WORK

Costa joined both our 1:1 sessions and the Explorer Mastermind (Now re-branded as #ADDAZEO Think Tank), and for three years, he worked with a focus and determination that was genuinely exceptional to watch.

The strategy we agreed on was disruptive by design. Not incremental growth, but a fundamental repositioning of how the business operated, who it served, and what it stood for. Changing the perception of food retail from the inside out, one decision at a time.

He travelled halfway around the world to meet suppliers directly, getting them on board with his vision in person rather than through a screen or a phone call. He built a management team capable of running operations without him at the centre. He restructured not just the business, but his relationship with it.

THE OUTCOME

Within three years, the first business was generating over £3 million in turnover, with healthy profit margins and a loyal customer base that had been built on reputation, not just convenience. The management team he’d built meant he was no longer needed in the day-to-day. The industry that had frustrated him was beginning to take notice of what he was doing and why.

He then launched a second business in food manufacturing, quickly applying the same methodology and taking it to turning over more than £2 million, built specifically to challenge what people believed was possible in the sector.

And then he stopped.

Not because he’d run out of ideas. Because he’d earned the right to pause.

Costa spent a year travelling the world with his wife and young family. Seeing places. Making memories. Meeting suppliers along the way, because when your business is built right, even a year away becomes productive. The ninety-hour weeks, the two outlets, the mediocre margins, the exit plan that was really a slow surrender, all of it replaced by a life that looked nothing like the one he’d described to me after that keynote.

He’s now back in the UK. The third business is being built. The target for year one is £1 million plus.

LEGACY

Costa came to me asking how to reach a million. The better question, the one that changed everything, was why.

When you know what you’re building it for, the number stops being the goal. Life becomes the goal. The number is just how you fund it.

If Costa’s story sounds familiar, the first step is understanding exactly where you stand.

Take the Business Freedom Assessment. It takes less than ten minutes, costs nothing, and tells you precisely what’s keeping you at the centre of your own business, and what it would take to change that.