Catherine was World Options’ first franchisee, having invested in it back in June 2012. However, she didn’t begin working in earnest until September as she and her family promptly went off for the holiday of a lifetime; a month touring the USA.

Catherine’s background is as an illustrator. Her degree was in Scientific Illustration and before World Options, she was a freelance illustrator for architects and the like, drawing detailed representations of plans. This role suited Catherine while bringing up her children as she was able to work from home.

A few years ago Catherine decided that she wanted to contribute more to the family finances, and franchising seemed the way to go. What she wanted was the ability to work from home; have flexible working hours in order to attend her children’s school plays and sports’ days; be her own boss and something that would yield enough money for a comfortable lifestyle. Having looked at other franchises, Catherine and her husband chose World Options.

Catherine now has around 90 regular customers and she aims for ten new ones each month. Most of her customers are within an hour’s radius of her home town of Preston. This was a conscious decision early on in her franchising career, as Catherine enjoys personal contact, always tries to meet with new customers and likes building relationships with them. She is quite clear that working from home can sometimes be lonely, and building these relationships ensures that this certainly isn’t the case with her.

The Portal is the single most important factor that makes World Options stand out as a franchiser, in Catherine’s opinion. In fact one of her long-term customers recently remarked “Oh Catherine, I love my Portal!” The simplicity of it, the ability to have one log in for multiple courier services and its many functions really does save users so much time. Time that could be better spent in their own businesses. 

It only took Catherine six months to build her business into a lucrative one, bringing in what she refers to as “a good income”. With a sound collection of regular clients, her business runs so well that if she takes a fortnight’s holiday, there is no loss of income whatsoever. Another added benefit to Catherine is the lack of expensive overheads. A computer at home is her office, and a mobile phone with internet connection means never having to miss a client’s call when she’s out and about.