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“In 2015 Marta started making men’s cosmetics and did everything on her own – from coming up with ideas to making the products, marketing and bookkeeping. Miķelis was also making and selling beard and moustache care products, which at the time, with the boom of specialised men’s barbershops, were quite a popular niche product. Their paths crossed at markets, and they decided to join forces. «Miķelis called and invited me for a coffee, and I immediately had the feeling that he would be the right person to work with easily. I had received offers to work together before, but with no one else did I feel it could work out. This time it felt like we had a similar view and vision of how we wanted to build this brand. It doesn’t happen often that competitors become colleagues. In fact, it was hard for Miķelis to manage everything alone – just like it was for me. What has worked out great is that I’m more responsible for ideas and production, while Miķelis is good at everything related to marketing, sales, partnerships and finding contacts,» says Marta. Miķelis adds that at first he thought the two businesses were competitors, but on second thought he realised that wasn’t the case and that working together opens up wider opportunities. «We are probably untypical Latvians,» he says.
Asked how they decided which brand would remain, Marta says that Miķelis’s products haven’t gone anywhere. He still has the Captain’s Beard line of beard and moustache products, as well as Miķelis’s moustache wax and Miķelis’s balm. «At that moment my brand was a little better known, so we stayed with that option. It was also more advantageous legally, as Miķelis has his own micro-enterprise dealing with other things,» she says. For now, Marta’s and Miķelis’s companies are bound by a cooperation agreement, but once turnover outgrows the micro-enterprise limit and they move to a classic limited liability company, they plan to set up a new joint company.
Read the full article in the 24 July issue of the newspaper Dienas Bizness, available at newsstands.”