For today’s Startup for 10 we have the fantastic Hustl team. Founded in 2023, this eCommerce business is currently comprised of two full-time co-founders, 2 freelancers and 3 developers.

Excitingly, Hustl is also one of our Silicon Gorge winners and are all set to pitch for a room full of ready investors on 4 June. Here to tell us more about their journey so far is co-founders Ben Shipway and Paul Bennett.

1 – In your own words – what do you do? 

We’re Hustl and we’ve created an App for entrepreneurs running eCommerce side businesses that optimises their tasks, sales channels, orders and shipping. This saves them precious time, effort and money so they can work smarter, not harder. 

2 – What’s the most exciting thing about what you’re doing? 

The most exciting thing is to be championing and enabling entrepreneurs. 

There is a growing wave of people with a strong entrepreneurial spirit who strive to build their own business. In the UK today, 1 in 4 UK adults have a side hustle and over 1.3 million of these are eCommerce related. 

However, despite the passion of building your own business, running an eCommerce venture comes with a big admin burden. Managing everything can be tough. There’s admin to sort out. Sales platforms to monitor. Orders to prioritise. Urgent tasks to deal with. The packing, weighing, finding the best shipping deal. These are the hassles nobody enjoys. 

These ventures are small, and often run around traditional day jobs, and for the most part single person enterprises. They often have bespoke offerings and made to order products to help them stand out. And in the world where Amazon Prime has raised customer expectations on next day shipping, it is something that burdens them every day in order to meet customer demand. 

Until now, this audience has not been catered for by eCommerce tools which are often aimed at bigger businesses and out of their price range. 

Enter Hustl! 

3 – What are you most proud of so far? 

We are very proud of creating a product and experience that is going to have a hugely positive impact on people’s lives. It will give some the encouragement to start their dream, some the capacity to grow, and some the ability to get precious time back to be with their families or to improve their health. We are also proud of our brand which is incredibly audience centric and has the ability to connect with our audience beyond our starting core product as we grow our community through more than just technology.

4 – What have you found most difficult about being a startup? 

We have enjoyed the process of creating Hustl. However, there are a couple of challenges we have had to deal with along the way: 

Firstly, as founders you literally have to have your hands on absolutely everything and we’ve needed to become a CFO and a COO in addition to areas where we feel more comfortable in product, tech and marketing. We’re learning fast! 

Secondly, raising investment is not a logical process. Two investors you believe will think alike can have very different views and expectations on business models and how investment should be allocated. 

5 – What would you do differently if you started now? 

In hindsight, we would have looked to get a very early prototype version into the hands of friendly testers to start the valuable ‘live customer’ feedback loop, whilst we continue to build the MVP for launch. 

6 – Where do you think you’ll be in 12 months? 

We’ll be fully launched, getting real traction in the UK market and be cash positive. We will be evolving our App proposition beyond core services to bring additional value to our users through insights and community. 

7 – What tools/people/services/organisations from the cluster have helped you most? 

We’re only relatively new to engaging with the cluster from a founders perspective but we have been trying to get involved in as much as we can. Attending as many meetups as we can from SouthWest Founders to Rebel Meetups to Third Thursday club, as well as a very interesting Meet the Funder event hosted at the EngineShed. 

We’re taking part in the PitchMe! event on the 2nd May as well as making the shortlist for Silicon Gorge which we are very excited about. 

And, of course we have our SPARKies tickets at the ready. 

8 – What’s the best thing about the Bristol & Bath tech cluster? 

There is just such a vibrant scene in and around Bristol and Bath run by some very dedicated and lovely people. In response to your question, we would say the fantastic and tireless team who continue to run events and meetups to bring founders together so that we can share and all benefit from our collective experiences. Thanks to the team!

9 – Who will you be nominating for a SPARKie next year? 

This is a tough question, there are so many great startups, as well as an incredible amount of awesome people helping startups through many areas. We’ve had some amazing support and excellent advice from our network and investors, and so I think there will be some great options for Mentor of the Year. Whilst, of course, secretly hoping that we scoop the coveted Startup of the Year award ourselves! 

10 – Where can we find out more about you? 

You can visit our website: morehustl.com or catch us on TikTok at Hustl.app.

Shona Wright

Shona covers all things editorial at TechSPARK. She publishes news articles, interviews and features about our fantastic tech and digital ecosystem, working with startups and scaleups to spread the word about the cool things they're up to. She also oversees TechSPARK's social media, sharing the latest updates on everything from investment news to green tech meetups and inspirational stories.

Apps Silicon Gorge Startups