Sitting on a home-grown winner

By ELLEN READ

An attempt at franchising did not work for Homesit NZ, so managing director Liz Bradley has a new approach.

Bradley established Homesit in the mid-1990s to secure people's homes while they travelled by providing carefully selected sitters to live in the house and care for pets.

Before coming to New Zealand, she spent many years working in the frontline of an international airline, mostly based in Britain.

Through meeting international travellers every day, Bradley recognised the impediments to travel faced by pet- and homeowners.

Nearly all were uncomfortable with the thought that their homes were left unattended.

There was a clearly expressed belief that, despite the best efforts of family, neighbours and friends, criminals can read the signs of absence as easily as most can read a book.

It was with these facts in mind that Bradley began to assemble the Homesit concept about 10 years ago.

At first, she ran the business from her home in Titirangi, and it has grown from there.

"We have now been operating for several years from a central Auckland office but have found a critical factor is the personal touch of someone meeting the homeowners in their own homes, especially if the person making the visit is a local with a local phone number and a presence in the local community," Bradley says.

To prove this point, she asked two of her most successful homesitters - a married couple - to act as agents running a Homesit pilot scheme on the North Shore.

Within weeks, business on the Shore went from slow and patchy to being the most active catchment area.

After this success, the company completed the paperwork necessary for franchising.

Despite a high degree of initial interest, Bradley says the offer did not attract franchisees with the right entrepreneurial attitude.

"The amount of turnover that inquirers perceived to be necessary in order to pay a franchise levy was a real turnoff for them."

In a bigger business, surpluses are more readily obtainable than in a small enterprise, and often the percentage net profit, particularly in the early years, may be in single figures.

This makes the thought of parting with 7-10 per cent of gross turnover as a royalty a frightening prospect for a small business operator.

Bradley says small business operators need to keep their costs to a minimum if they are to have a reasonable surplus available for their own use.

To achieve this, she decided to back away from the franchise model, instead re-packaging and re-pricing Homesit as a small business unit with one purchase price for each unit.

The new owner pays $17,900 plus GST for a licensed territory, and keeps all profits from the business. The only payment to Homesit after the purchase is a small charge (about $20 a week) for maintenance of the database included in the purchase price.

Furthermore, that maintenance payment is not payable until after the first year.

Bradley says Homesit business units are ideally suited to the businesswoman who has left a demanding profession to have a family.

They are also ideal for retirees who have experience, lots of energy and skills to offer, and who find that retirement has come too early for them.

Homesit NZ has just started selling business units throughout New Zealand.

Bradley has also had interest from Canada and Australia.

"There is no reason why the concept shouldn't be successful anywhere with a similar type of society to ours.

"We have certainly proved it works in New Zealand."

Demand for Homesit NZ's service has doubled each year for the past three years, and shows no sign of slowing.

In any given month, Homesit will typically provide about 60 person/weeks of care for houses and pets in the Auckland area.

Inquiries also flow in from throughout the country.

Most of them still come from Auckland, but sits have also been managed in Christchurch, Wellington, Tauranga, Rotorua, Manawatu and Wairarapa.

Plans are underway to expand in all those areas.

* Liz Bradley can be contacted by email at Liz@homesit.co.nz, or by phone at Auckland (09) 309-9300.