It may not be apparent at first but the unassuming town of Bromsgrove near Birmingham is actually a thriving hotbed of entrepreneurship. It is, of course, the home of Gymshark founder Ben Francis, who has reportedly amassed an enormous $1.2bn fortune since launching the brand just over a decade ago.
Three of his old school friends, who also grew up in the town, have also recently made it onto The Sunday Times’ under-35 rich list. Another Bromsgrove resident who has decided to follow in their footsteps and launch their own business is mum and yoga teacher Hannah Burton, who recently founded PADA which specialises in knee-padded leggings.
The idea for the business came about when the 32-year-old gave birth to her daughter in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and later struggled with post-partum depression as well as the sense that sense that her body “just simply didn’t move like it used to”. She said: “I slowly started trying to ease back into movement for my own wellbeing.
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“The gyms were closed due to Covid and I had neither the energy nor the well-fitting gym clothes to tackle them. I turned to yoga as it’s really good for my mental health.”
However, she soon began to struggle with knee pain after spending so much time crawling on the floor to play with her young daughter. After sewing old bra pads into her existing yoga leggings, she decided there had to be a better way forward.
She said: “When I started back with yoga after my pregnancy experience, I found I was looking online for something that would help protect my knees and I couldn’t find anything that looked nice and also was relevant to my experience of gym work and also yoga.”
Hannah said she soon found that there were seemingly no discreetly-padded yoga leggings on the UK market and therefore decided to create PADA, with its subtle knee pad stitched into the fabric for hidden support. She said: “I wanted to create sportswear that was respectful of women’s bodies and empowered them to do whatever they wanted, with no limitations.
“I just wanted to look like me, move like me, and feel good while doing so.”
She continued: “We have worked with multiple suppliers to to get this right because we really wanted to give the best and most perfect leggings to our customers. It’s a hard task with the knee pads because I didn’t want to look like I was going to some sort of roller disco in the 90s and I also didn’t want to look like I was working on a building site.
“I wanted something that looked seamless and integrated. I wanted to create something that simply lets you get the job done.”
Hannah went on to say that one of the biggest challenges of starting a new business is “trying to get the word out” as well as raising the necessary funds. However, she is optimistic she can make her a business success like Bromsgrove’s other entrepreneurs have done in the past.
“I’m always looking at Gymshark for inspiration,” she said. “He [Ben Francis] is definitely someone I look up to.”
You can find out more about PADA on its Kickstarter here as well as its website here.
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