Revenue at the Sarina Russo Group has flat-lined for the past two years, but the group continues to be a dominant player in the recruitment and education space. The company started when in 1979 Russo hired a single room and starter her own typing and commercial practices business, The Office Academy with just nine students. Operating for the past 35 years, the company employs 1000 people across 40 sites in Australia and the United Kingdom. In the UK, Sarina Russo Job Access has been recognised as a top provider for finding work for 18-24 year olds.
Diana Williams revolutionised the Australian fitness industry in 1989 by establishing a chain of women-only gyms. Now the Fernwood Fitness founder and managing director is applying the same philosophy to investing.
Williams has signed up as a member of Scale Investors, a network that encourages women to invest in early-stage companies. She’s looking to achieve the same success as she has had with Fernwood, which now has tens of thousands of employees and locations across the country.
Barb de Corti’s environmentally friendly cleaning products business ENJO turns 20 this year. In November last year de Corti launched a new company called Zabada, which sells products to the United States using the same micro fibre technology behind ENJO.
De Corti previously told SmartCompany she spends half of each day looking at trends which affect ENJO and the other half of her day imparting this knowledge to her team.
“Have your eyes on the business and not in the business,” she says.
“Very often in the early days I was working in the business which then could only grow as far as my knowledge could, so working on the business and learning from external sources I can grow the business.”
In 2013 The Heat Group started selling direct to the public for the first time, launching an online shop. This follows on from a bumper 2012 where the company signed a deal with Warner Brothers Consumer Products to sell a range of the company’s personal care range, estimated to generate $20 million with three to five years.
Despite having a reasonably quiet 2013 with no major deals, it’s clear The Heat Group has come a long way from the coffee shop where it was founded 14 years ago. The company now has more than 100 employees and continues to be a leader in the cosmetics industry.
The past 12 months have been big for the founder of Carman’s Fine Food Carolyn Creswell. She’s appeared on Channel Ten’s television show Recipe to Riches as one of three judges and a mentor and her business has grown by an estimated $5 million. Her personal fortune is estimated to be around $40 million and she has also previously been named Telstra Business Woman of the Year. The business originally started as a $1000 venture, but now it makes a range of muesli, muesli bars and porridges found in Coles and Woolworths, as well as 32 other countries around the globe.
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Cara Waters is a former SmartCompany editor. Previously, Cara was a senior reporter for the Financial Times’ website and worked for The Sunday Times in London.
