Bed linen start-up bags £150k investment

Published by

Nicky Godding

An on-line quality bed linen brand which only launched last year has secured £150,000 of investment after being crowned of a national start-up competition.

Tetbury-based Bedfolk was set up by husband-and-wife combo Nick and Jo James last year. With backgrounds in interior design and business development, they even used their honeymoon to tour textile mills, teaming up with a third-generation family-run operation in North Portugal to develop an exclusive range of premium-quality cotton bedding which they sell direct to customers through their on-line shop. The brand also now sells to interior designers, boutique hotels and guest houses - including the recently-opened Bibury Farm Barns, a luxury getaway near Bibury.

The investment follows a summer which has seen the business treble revenues and be named a finalist in the the South West Family Business of the Year category of the Great British Entrepreneur Awards.

the £150,000 investment has been made by Worth Capital, a London-based angel investment network. Nick and Jo plan to use the funding to expand their product range, build the team and market the brand.

Nick said: "Good bedding is such a worthwhile investment considering the time amount of time we spend on it. But it's a product category riddled with overcomplexity and confusion. Our proposition is to offer high quality bed linen, made responsibly at an accessible price.

Nicky Godding

Nicky Godding is editor of The Business Magazine. Before her journalism career, she worked mainly in public relations moving into writing when she was invited to launch Retail Watch, a publication covering retail and real estate across Europe. After some years of constant travelling, she tucked away her passport and concentrated on business writing, co-founding a successful regional business magazine. She has interviewed some of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs who have built multi-million-pound businesses and reported on many science and technology firsts. She reports on the region’s thriving business economy from start-ups, family businesses and multi-million-pound corporations, to the professionals that support their growth and the institutions that educate the next generation of business leaders.