The same loan that cost fifteen thousand a year in interest in 2009 costs forty thousand today. Nothing about the business changed.

The fact of the week is deliberately disconnected from the topic this week, and it is worth it. On 30 April 1993, Sir Tim Berners-Lee had the World Wide Web released into the public domain, royalty free forever. No patent, no licensing fee, not a penny ever. He later told Forbes he could have been a billionaire and that he was happy he was not. That opens up when enough is actually enough, Felix Dennis, James Martin saying he wants to be doing a commercial property deal in his nineties, and Charlie admitting he has never had an original idea in his life.

Then the main topic. Matt spent time this week with a founder six years in who has put the best part of a quarter of a million of his own money into his company, and is being strangled by the interest rather than the idea. So Matt ran the numbers. A 750,000 pound business mortgage cost around 15,000 a year in interest in 2009. The same loan today is about 40,000.

What that does to behaviour is the real subject. Personal guarantees that quietly undo the entire point of a limited company. Asset finance at eleven percent. Why Matt has carried no debt for three years, and how the business went from seven million to heading for fourteen with no new capital at all, by changing the stock model instead of borrowing. He is also candid about going bust once already, and what borrowing too much too quickly actually costs you.

Wins of the week cover a wax jacket, family dinners, and Charlie moving faster on something than he would have a year ago. Then the question of the week: cheap money and easy growth, or expensive money that forces you to build something genuinely profitable? After an hour arguing that money should be cheaper, Matt's answer is not the one you would expect.

Takeaways:
📊 The same 750,000 pound business mortgage cost about 15,000 a year in interest in 2009 and around 40,000 today
🧠 Berners-Lee gave the web away royalty free, and that may be exactly why it worked
💷 Personal guarantees, and what they do to the whole point of a limited company
🚩 Why Matt has carried no debt for three years and grew anyway
🎯 Cheap money and easy growth, or expensive money that forces you to be profitable?

Chapters:
Chapters:

(00:00) Merch for Alex's hunting trip

(03:19) "I thought episode 88 was shit"

(04:34) British Business Fact of the Week

(06:56) Giving the World Wide Web away for nothing

(08:13) Would it have scaled if it had cost money?

(11:10) When is enough actually enough?

(12:30) "None of my ideas have been original"

(15:28) James Martin on why he will not stop

(18:01) Will anything that big ever be given away again?

(23:02) Episode 90: the death of cheap money

(24:13) The founder who put a quarter of a million in

(25:17) The numbers, 2009 versus today

(28:47) Unsecured lending and the high risk end

(30:46) Charlie on financing machinery

(32:14) Should the government back creative ideas?

(34:03) Revenue per square foot, bursting at the seams

(37:05) Personal guarantees and limited liability

(40:00) Funding growth from profit instead of debt

(41:15) "I have gone bust, look on Companies House"

(43:56) Growing without capital, 7 million to 14

(46:14) Win of the Week: the Lockwood Arthur wax jacket

(48:21) Sitting down for dinner as a family

(51:09) Charlie: acting fast on last week's conversation

(54:30) Claude's Question of the Week

(57:40) Why interest improves decision making

Follow Matt:
📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mrmattholland/
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Follow Charlie:
📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theworkwearexpert
👨‍💻 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/charlie-smith-1a55295b/