Young Entrepreneurs

For all those with great ideas, and not so great follow through routines.

Entrepreneur Sophie Boyce talks about starting her own business at age 20.

“Never give up on your goals!”

“Follow your dream!”

“Never let anyone tell you you can’t make it!”

These are all repeated bumper stickers we hear in our twenties. 

Given that our goals and ideals aren’t really clear yet, “follow your dream” is a tricky advice to give at best, the first problem being that most of us don’t actually know what our dream is yet.

I’m a firm believer that to know what you want to do in life, you first have to know what you don’t like doing, thus trying a little bit of everything.

The chances to know what you want to do the rest of your life and following a specific bullet point plan to make that goal come true seams unlikely. 

It seems we early twenty year olds get ideas about what we want to do and pursue every five seconds, some can be pretty brilliant, some difficult, and some plain unrealistic. 

The problem with this recurrent phenomena is that it becomes increasingly difficult to identify which dreams we can and should pursue, and which others to put in the back burner.

As smart, creative young adults, it's important to identify that what we lack, as a generation is not intelligence or wit, but mere effort.


My official diagnostic for our generation?: 
Perseverance Deficit Disorder.

22 year old Sophie Boyce announced she was opening her very own musical theatre school about three years ago.

With some experience working before on film and T.V, she made her graduation short film “Mâché Man” in 2012, releasing it as the first official production from Spirit: Young Performers Company.

The short film, which entered the official London Independent Film Festival selection that same year and the soundtrack, “Made of Paper” performed by 11 year old Oliver Award winner Cleo Demetriou from Matilda the Musical and Les Miserables, received great attention online. The same music video already has more than 30,000 views in Youtube and worked as the perfect presentation card of what Spirit could offer young performers all around the country.

To this day, Spirit is buzzing all around London, already with more than 100 students and every final graduation performance professionally filmed, so the young artists can show it in any future audition.

Spirit has already earned the attention from The Telegraph, naming the article, in honour of it’s founder: “Drama school earns rave reviews on Youtube”.

We asked Sophie a few questions, not only for any young entrepreneur out there but for anyone else in need of a bit of inspiration to make their goal a reality.

inkBox: What made you think of Spirit for the first time?

What did you think it could offer that didn’t exist yet?

S.B: I love musicals. Actually, musical theatre was always a greater passion of mine than film, but I couldn’t sing or dance whilst I could hold a camera and tell people what to do… So I started making films instead! Then I decided I wanted to direct musical films but I didn’t want to sit around waiting for that opportunity to arise, nor work my way up from a runner… I wanted it to happen now. 

I also love working with children and after seeing Matilda the Musical in the West End, I knew I wanted in – I wanted to work with kids like that and produce work to that standard. 

So put the two together, and somehow the idea came about: I could work with kids (the very best kids, hopefully), produce showtunes (original ones, hopefully) and get the camera out – make it a film. And have people watch, hopefully.

inkBox.- What kind of education and information did you need to start the business and where did you get it from?

S.B: I have to admit, I kind of blagged it. My parents told me to attend classes in business and networking, but I never did. As far as education goes, a degree in practical filmmaking helps with the filmmaking part of it… and then surrounding myself with people who are very talented in theatre; advertising choreographer jobs and being lucky enough to generate the interest of West End creatives for the roles. 

Saying this now, I realise why people are surprised when I tell them I started the business by myself. My only experience of performing arts schools really was attending a couple of bad ones myself as a kid. As far as research goes, I had spent years trying to find a good dance-school for my little sister and being continually frustrated that so few performing arts schools seemed to take the kids seriously. So much wasted talent and time. 

I knew what I DIDN’T want Spirit to be, and that was all the information I had really, to begin with. Other than that I just had a very clear image of the type of company we were going to be, the type of videos we were going to make and the type of audience we were going to generate… And then focused on making it happen.

inkBox.- What would you say were the main challenges you first encountered when starting the company?

S.B: Finding customers! 
It’s hard to get people to take a chance on you. 
Right away I was getting the attention of serious stage-parents. But it’s a big risk for a serious stage-parent to take a chance on a brand new endeavour, to put their little star in the hands of a potential failure, and trust the words of a random 20-year-old film school graduate. These parents want the best for their kids, after all. 

The first workshop we did, I had 8 kids and only 3 of them paid. The rest were all kids I practically begged to take scholarships! 

inkBox.- The company has earned so much attention online. Was including social media always a plan for the school?

S.B: Yes. I knew I wanted to build an audience for these kids. I’m still working hard to get that audience to the size I want it to be… But it’s finally heading in the right direction.

There wouldn’t be a business without social media. I don’t know how these other drama schools manage to get anyone through the doors without it! 
With YouTube, our clients can see EXACTLY what they’re signing up for... that’s usually how they know about us. Then I also used Facebook advertising, which worked pretty well, and Instragram is a good one for us as well. 

Nowadays it’s pretty much all word-of-mouth bringing in the kids, but for six months or so I was 100% reliant on social media. 

inkBox.- What would you say is the most useful or important lesson you’ve learned during these two years running a company?

S.B: To be tough and sure of yourself. I’m still working on it. 
I think – maybe because I’m young – people overstep the line a bit; parents want to make ‘suggestions’ (tell me how to run my own company) or they make ridiculous demands or they take a mile. 

I am confident in myself and in my business… but I’m also too polite to some of those people; nodding along and saying ‘I understand’ even when they’re out of line. So I’ve learned I need to be tougher; put my foot down more, say ‘no’, say ‘leave it to me – I’m the expert’, say ‘Please don’t call me at 10.30 on a Friday night’, say ‘no, I will not turn away talented children just so your child can be the star… why on earth would I do that?’.

inkBox.- If you could give an advice now to yourself two years ago, when starting the company, what would it be?

S.B: Charge more money!! Our prices are the same as the average London theatre school – but the kids get so much more from Spirit, and then some. 
Would I have lost potential clients with higher prices? I don’t really think so. I think you are what you sell yourself for – sell yourself high, and people will believe you’re worth it. Then prove to them you’re worth it.

inkBox.- What does the future of Spirit look like? Any new plans?

S.B: I want us to reach more of an audience. 

I want my own studios in Central London. 

I want to watch more of my kids get into more West End shows. 

I want us to put on a full-length musical, and sell out tickets. 

I want to have kids training with me 4 days a week. 

I want our own reality T.V show or web series!

I want a touring musical theatre troupe. 

I want every child I have who is aged 8/9 to be in Matilda the Musical in the next couple of years! 

I want us to perform at West End Live and at Move It, and get a performance slot on a TV talk show. 

I want to hit one million online subscribers. 

I want one of my kids to play Sophie in Stephen Spielberg’s ‘BFG’! 

All of those are my dreams, and most of them are my firm plans.







Inspired enough yet?
After that interview, I should probably get out of bed myself and start making something happen as well...