Your Business: Working from home - Philip Hutton

Philip and Hannah Hutton, owners of The Great New Zealand Christmas Cake Company and Gifted.

Philip and Hannah Hutton are the owners of The Great New Zealand Christmas Cake Company and Gifted.

Can you tell me about your businesses?

My wife Hannah and I own two businesses. The first is The Great New Zealand
Christmas Cake Company, which we've owned for the past 10 years. It's very much a family business, with my sister Jill managing our artisan bakery full time, while we focus on the marketing and sales sides of the business from home.

Our second business is called Gifted - a gourmet cookie gifting service, which we launched in October.

Can you describe your working environment at home?

We have a dedicated office at home with two computer workstations; our home office is inside our house and we didn't need to do any alterations to accommodate working from home. We do have an IT setup that involves secure remote access to our business server at our bakery premises though, and we have fast internet access and a very high data limit.

We also do a lot of initial product testing in our home kitchen, so our kitchen is always filled with Christmas cakes, puddings and gourmet cookies.

Why have you decided to be based at home?

We decided before we had children that we both wanted to be at home as much as we could with our children until they began school. We have two children - Ryder is nine and India is five - and for the last nine years this has been our focus.

So has this been the major benefit for you in working from home?

Yes. The greatest thing is we've both been able to spend so much time with our children in their preschool years. Also, we're able to be really efficient with the time that we do work - because we don't have to commute to work this saves us nearly 20 hours a week between us, compared to when we worked in corporate roles. Our bakery is also really close to our house, so that's made things easy.

How about what's not so good? What are the challenges?

For the last nine years we've always had at least one of our children at home with us. And it's certainly been really easy to put work off and spend time with our kids, so finding the right balance for us has been challenging. Also, children under five don't understand very well when a phone call is important, or when Dad can't be disturbed. But compared to the benefits we've enjoyed, these have been really pretty small challenges.

Is perception an issue for you working from home?

We usually organise meetings with suppliers at their premises. And the first meeting with any supplier is usually pretty amusing with Hannah and myself, and usually one or both of the children walking in. Luckily, both of our children are well behaved so taking our children has never been a problem.

Most customers wouldn't even know that we mostly work from home, but there are always a few of our regular customers that pop into our home on Christmas Eve because they've forgotten to organise their Christmas cakes. For these people I think it helps personalise our business more, which can't be a bad thing.

Do you think you'll base the business from home in the foreseeable future, or do you have plans to be located elsewhere?

We'll continue working from home because the benefits are just too great for us. And now that both of our children are at school, working from home is significantly easier and we're able to work longer hours more easily as well.

What's a key tip you'd have for anyone else considering working from home?
In our experience there are lots of benefits to working from home and few downsides, but setting up a business requires a huge commitment in terms of your mental energy and time. So I'd say don't waste your time on a poorly considered business idea. If you are going to set up a home business, take it seriously and make it something you'll be proud of.