Diving in
Zannah Ingraham
- March 2008.
Prospects talks to two graduates who turned a passion for scuba diving into a successful business start-up.
 Caroline and Nick Robertson-Brown studied Biology and Environmental Biology at the University of Manchester. After beginning their careers in teaching and environmental consultancy, they decided to quit the rat race to become scuba diving instructors - a decision which led them into the world of the small business start-up.
‘We went to work in the Caribbean as diving instructors just over five years ago,’ explains Nick. ‘But we were working on a tiny island and I guess we were a little stir crazy working for someone else and thought well we could do this for ourselves.’
Getting started
‘We decided to start the business while we were still in the Caribbean,’ explains Caroline. ‘We looked at all of the costings and found a failing dive centre that was for sale back in Liverpool and decided to move the business over to Manchester. Nick came home from the Caribbean before me and did the financial arrangements for buying the business which we funded by re-mortgaging our house. We arrived back in the UK in June 2004 and by September we were fully functional.’
Nick and Caroline’s business Orca Divers now has seven dive instructors and a successful dive shop in Manchester, and they regularly take groups of divers out to destinations throughout the world. But as any entrepreneur will tell you, their decision to go it alone didn’t come without a few bumps along the way.
‘Money is always a worry, as anyone will tell you when you’re setting up a new business,’ explains Nick. ‘There have been times where we have had many, many sleepless nights, wondering how we are going to pay the bills and whether is it all going to come together and you know, it did, but it really can be very scary.
Baby steps
‘You really have to know your audience; know who you are appealing to and what you are trying to sell. A lot of companies go under because they try and stretch themselves too much early on. It’s very important to take baby steps - just one at a time.’
Scuba diving has always been a passion for us and now we get to do it as a living.
Caroline Orca Dive
Nick and Caroline attribute their success to their passion for the work that they do. ‘My advice to other graduates setting up businesses would be to make sure that you are very clear what you want before you set up and that it is something that you are going to enjoy,’ says Caroline. ‘Scuba diving has always been a passion for us and now we get to do it as a living. That’s the best part of our job, especially when we get to go diving abroad which we do six or seven times a year’
‘You really do have to love what you are doing,’ agrees Nick ‘You can do eighteen hour days, day in day out and still not make the books balance and if you’re not enjoying what you’re doing I think you would fold. You’ve got to stick at it - if you’re not enjoying it then you’re not going to make it.’
Ready to go it alone?
The National Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship offers a range of advice and guidance to graduates considering a business start-up. It covers everything from the initial advice you need to get going including business planning, regional funding and business law to the practicalities of running a business including health and safety, trading standards and data protection. For more information visit Flying Start
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