Build It. They'll Come‪.‬ Helen Dalley

How 15 year old Michael Chugg transformed his love of music, and particularly Aussie rock music, into a major business empire, that ended up bringing to Australia, promoting, staging concerts and touring many of THE biggest music stars & bands in the world.

Stars like Elton John, Robbie Williams, Bob Dylan, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, the Police, Dixie Chicks, Madonna and so many more. Michael Chugg backed himself, built relationships in the music business not just locally, but in the UK and the US as well.

So how did he do it? By never being afraid of hard work, doing everything that was needed to put on a major concert tour, and he means EVERYTHING. And what are his insights into resilience and longevity in a fast-changing music industry? Always putting the customer – that is, the acts and the fans – first, he says. They are the most important piece of the pie, and if they are right, well, the money would follow.

Michael Chugg started Michael Chugg Entertainment in the late 70’s; then co-founded Frontier Touring with the late Michael Gudinski; and more recently he started Chugg. Entertainment on his own.

Over 5 decades later, he's still taking risks, still scouting and supporting young Aussie music talent, and in this time of the pandemic when musicians are joining together to urge us all to get vaccinated, Michael Chugg is still optimistic about the post-COVID-19 live music scene. Hope you enjoy Part 1 of my chat with Michael Chugg.

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After great success in the UK with her hand-made, artisanal, ethically sourced chocolate company, Coco Chocolate, with 2 stores in Edinburgh and a successful contract supplying Harvey Nichols' signature chocolates, Rebecca Knights returned to Australia, with small children, and was thrown what she calls a few curve-balls. But in Part 2, Rebecca reveals how start-up entrepreneurs must be resilient enough to navigate the disasters & learn "new tricks" as she puts it. Rebecca reckons she was long ago experienced in that area, as she explains what led to her leaving home and fending for herself at such a young age, and never being afraid of hard work.How she changed course several times in her business to develop new ways to expand and grow offers unique insights into the sort of grit and determination needed to sell a hand-made food product in your own start-up. So what happened when the COVID-19 pandemic struck? Well hear for yourself how, among other things, online e-commerce came to save the day. Hope you enjoy Part 2 of this candid interview with Rebecca Knights.

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Rebecca Knights built a boutique chocolate company and the Sydney Chocolate School by sticking to her dream of producing all hand-made, artisanal chocolates, tempered on marble, using the finest ethically sourced ingredients from both here and overseas. After leaving home at the tender age of 16, she knew she would have to build a life, and she hoped a business, for herself. While she was neither a trained chef, nor a food technician, she put in the hard yards washing dishes and then waiting on tables in restaurants, before finally getting an education. How she then translated her creativity into training in the age-old European tradition to become a chocolatier in France, then creating a product -- a finely crafted chocolate product at that -- designing the beautiful packaging and selling her wares in the UK, including to prestigious Harvey Nicholls department stores, and achieving that all by herself, is a story of determination and chutzpah. She's even innovated to produce completely sugar-free chocolate! Yes, sugar-free. And despite intense competition in the chocolate industry Rebecca never allowed the mass-produced sweet stuff on supermarket shelves that dominates sales in the industry to snuff out her entrepreneurial dream.  But her journey is not without salutary lessons, given considerable business high's and low's. But how she deals with them is a lesson in smarts, leadership and plain grit. Hope you enjoy Rebecca Knights!

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High school dropout Luke Anear didn’t set out to build a global technology company that was recently valued at over $2billion, but that’s exactly what happened when he saw a problem in the workplace – namely accidents that didn’t have to happen – and started to help solve it. Luke created his mobile safety and quality checklist app that became SafetyCulture. Now, Luke’s vision is expanding, with grand designs to build a global e-marketplace for any consumables used in a workplace, from work boots to chefs’ aprons, a kind of Amazon for the workplace, as he describes it. And ever wondered why those big global tech stocks have staggeringly high valuations? Well, Luke gives a feisty explanation of why they’re not ridiculous! Plus, he shares some heart-felt thoughts on sudden wealth and what to do with it. Enjoy Part 2 of my chat with Luke Anear.

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When Luke Anear worked as a private investigator  investigating workplace mishaps and chasing workers' compo cheats, he realised he wanted to turn that negative into a positive. So he set about helping companies vastly improve their safety procedures in the workplace, to try and prevent workers having accidents in the first place. His little startup took shape in the proverbial garage of his suburban Townsville home, and he began slowly, selling safety checklists delivered on Word documents. But then Luke Anear transformed his little business baby into a multi-million dollar global technology empire, when he and a uni dropout mate created an app, called iAuditor -- essentially a mobile safety checklist app to suit each individual workplace. That completely changed Luke Anear's life, and set SafetyCulture on course to become a $2 billion Aussie success story.How that has mushroomed to now service almost 28,000 customers around the world, and what Luke Anear has learned along the way from the smartest venture capital investors in the room, including mentors and supporters like Atlassian's Scott Farquhar is a story and a half. Plus what Luke learned and how he navigated the panic-struck arrival of the COVID pandemic offers lessons for most entrepreneurs. Hope you enjoy Luke Anear!

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Kim McKay doesn’t really consider herself an entrepreneur. But that’s exactly what she is, having built not 1, but 2, impressive “empires”. The non-science trained marketing guru is transforming the Aust Museum – yes, the one Sydney-siders all remember going to on school excursions, a natural history museum and Australia’s oldest museum – from being somewhat faded-around-the-edges to now bringing it firmly into the 21st century digital age, as a world-class cultural institution. How is she doing it? By cajoling politicians who control the pursestrings, inspiring scientists to continue their research and engaging supporters and the public alike to take a fresh look at the Museum’s newly refurbed spaces, including the new glittering glass box entrance. Kim reveals how she twists arms! And already she’s increased attendance numbers several-fold. 

Perhaps less known is the 1st “empire” Kim McKay helped build into a global not-for-profit phenomenon – the Clean Up Australia & Clean Up the World community campaigns. That event started in 1989 from a tiny idea solo yachtsman & pal Ian Kiernan had, to clear waterways of plastic and rubbish. With the support, hard work and passion of his co-founder Kim McKay, the pair first launched Clean Up Sydney Harbour, which turned out to be a dazzling success on the 1st weekend it was held. So just how did they build that up into the successful & substantial Clean Up Australia campaign -- a volunteer, community-based event that in its first year alone involved over 200 cities and towns across Australia? Well, when Kim managed to get the United Nations involved, Kiernan and McKay took their “Clean Up” to the world!  The Clean Up movement became one of Australia’s most successful public action campaigns ever. And that campaign helped transformed community awareness about the damage from ocean pollution.  Enjoy the dynamo that is Kim McKay!

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