Thriving Despite Adversity:

Learning from the companies that flourished during COVID-19

In a tough year for many businesses, a minority have shone: pharmaceutical groups boosted by their desire to alleviate pressure from overflooding health systems, small companies making the pivot to online and food and drink technology wizards looking to change the game for retailers everywhere. 

Success during a crisis can be uncomfortable. According to Yelp.com’s Local Economic Impact Report, more than 97,966 businesses have permanently shut down as a direct result of the pandemic, while a number of other businesses adapted and thrived. 

When a crisis hits, there are three stages in which companies can fall or fly: They can attempt to be less severely affected by the initial impact of the crisis, they can try their hand at a faster recovery, or they can seize the crisis to improve on their pre-crisis position. In the first stage, when leaders were focused on minimizing the immediate impact, vital companies only slightly outperformed their peers. As the crisis continued, however, the focus shifted to the second and third stages, in which the following companies significantly outperformed.

LetsGetChecked

When Dubliner Peter founded LetsGetChecked in 2015, his intention was to provide a service where health testing kits could be sent directly to people’s homes for individual use. This proved useful in a number of ways; by freeing up valuable GP/hospital waiting times, bringing down the price of simple yet costly examinations such as STI examinations and getting the Irish public interested in taking charge of their own health. When the pandemic came, Foley’s two main bases of his business – at-home testing and health-centred wellness – came to the fore. He, and his team, then managed to ramp up production to further aid the health system and cater to a newly health-conscious audience. Today, LetsGetChecked currently employs more than 600 people, with plans to add an extra 150, sales have grown up 1,500% year on year and, to date, it has shipped more than 3 million tests covering health and wellness indicators such as cholesterol, thyroid test, men’s and women’s health test, along with sexual health tests and COVID-19 swabs. It also gained its unicorn status (valuation of over €1bn) last year. 

Teamwork

Founded in 2007 by Daniel Mackey and Peter Coppinger, Teamwork is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company whose clients include Disney, Netflix, Paypal, HP, Panasonic and Spotify. It was built to allow employees to manage all of their client work in one platform – from invoicing, to time tracking, to unlimited client access. When COVID-19 hit, the then 13-year-old team thought the worst part of working from home was missing their daily routine and not seeing colleagues for morning flat whites. Teamwork’s 20,000 customers – all hailing from different industries – were immediately at a standstill, pivoting to online for the foreseeable. The team at Teamwork decided to pivot with them. Their technology became 100% cloud-based which meant it was business as usual for all who used the platform. All of their customer-facing teams were equipped to operate as normal in this environment, testing thoroughly throughout. Staff safety remained paramount, closing their offices for weeks at a time and suspending employee travel. And millions were raised in investments to continue to fund growth. Co-founder Peter Coppinger summed it up as he wrote, via their website, ‘The best way for us to help our customers is to ensure that they continue to receive the highest quality service without disruption.

Flipdish

Flipdish was co-founded in 2015 by two brothers Conor and James McCarthy to help independent restaurants take control of their digital business. They wanted eateries to be able to control their own online capabilities, rather than relying on mark-up delivery players such as Deliveroo, JustEat and Uber Eats. In an interview with SiliconRepublic in March 2020, Conor McCarthy said it was hard to get customers to believe in Flipdish at the beginning of its journey. “We were unproven and therefore a risky choice in their eyes, but we were very confident that our product and approach would deliver significant ROI,” he said. Then the pandemic happened. All of Ireland’s restaurants suddenly had to garner an online presence to stay alive. Flipdish made that easy, putting together webinars, offering unbiased advice and catering to companies outside of their client base as well as offering COVID-compliant solutions such as individual kiosks and personalised digital experiences. Flipdish now operates across 25 countries and secured unicorn status (reaching a $1.25bn valuation) last year.

Each of these companies followed the following three principles when faced with adversity: 

1. Listen to the feedback life gives you

The pandemic told everyone we needed to stay indoors in solitude. Each of these companies took this idea and ran with it. It may have been painful, but necessary, especially in the face of business.

2. Whatever you direct your focus on, you attract

Whether you believe in manifestation or not, setting goals is a good way to redirect yourself if you get bogged down or distracted. When you focus on negativity, it triggers a motion where you continue to see more negativity, and attract more negative people into your life. The same goes for your finances, your love life, your health, your faith, anything. When you want to see nothing but negative, you only focus on the losses. When you only focus on gratitude and wins, you see nothing but things to be grateful for and small victories that add up to the big wins.

3. Amidst uncertainty, the person who boasts certainty will always win

Certainty is the currency of the time – just ask Joe Duffy. You can build certainty in yourself by being honest with yourself and realising you might not have all the answers now, but you have the ability to suss them out. Crises, like the pandemic, have a way of sharpening our skills. Now is the time to work on your leadership skills, so we can lead with certainty and power. 

Financial advisor to the Irish community pharmacy sector, food & beverage, SME and retail.

We at Fitzgerald Power have spent thirty years offering creative solutions to a diverse range of clients across Ireland, and the UK, and we’re pretty proud of what we’ve helped our clients to achieve. We enable and empower businesses to reach any and every goal. Whatever the job, we don’t offer anything less than the best. We work across a range of sectors, including pharmacy, food & beverage, SME and retail. Please get in touch today if you would like to speak to any of our experts.

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