A TEEN entrepreneur who started his electronics business with just £500 says he’s turned the company into a £1million business.
Ben Ewart from Hull, Yorkshire was just 19 when he founded Switch Electronics, which distributes electronic parts across the UK.
4
He confirmed to The Sun, after first speaking to HullLive, that he started the firm after realising he could buy cheap parts directly from manufacturers in China before flogging them in the UK for less than high street retailers.
Ben, now 26, started with just a single shop on eBay.
Fast-forward seven years and he employs five people to run the business, which has its own website, as well as an eBay and Amazon shop, selling everything from wires and sensors to tools.
Ben told The Sun that he sells to 130 different countries around the world and is forecast to reach his one millionth order in two month’s time.
4
Switch Electronics also has a large warehouse in Sutton Fields, Hull, which has a trade counter on site.
The entrepreneur said: “I was 19 when I began importing a few bits from China, and selling them on eBay. I think I started out with about £500 in my pocket.
“The original aim was to be a professional golfer, and I was doing this in my spare time. It eventually got to a point where it was expanding so fast that the other job I was doing became a bit redundant.”
Ben’s company made an impressive £1million+ in sales in 2019, while his annual accounts for 2018 (the latest available) detail a turnover of £793,213 and an operating profit of £112,134.
4
And Ben reckons starting a business as a teen is the ideal time to do it as you’re unlikely to have the pressures of a family to provide for or a mortgage to meet.
“You haven’t got as much to lose,” Ben said. “Just take the risk and go for it.”
But it doesn’t stop there. Ben also has big ambitions for the future – hoping to open a bigger warehouse, take on more staff and push the company’s sales to up to £15million.
4
He said: “I need a bigger space, and we want to take a few more people on as well. In the industry there are some really big names, and one day I would like to get to where they are today.
“We currently turnover £1million a year, but I would like to become a £10million to £15million turnover business.”
In related news, we spoke to another teen who left school at 16 and is now making £20,000 a week selling trainers.
We also talked to the uni mates who turned their healthy eating habit into a £9million protein bar and shake business.
And the man who opened the first-ever McDonald’s in Yorkshire now turns over £54million a year.
