They say you should start them young.
And Juliet Rathbone did just that with her four children when she launched her St Andrews shop Farmore Interiors in the 1990s.
Holidays were spent working behind the till, weekends involved picking out fabrics at trade shows in London, and after-school hobbies included sewing curtains.
And their exposure to the world of entrepreneurship from a young age has paid off, with each of them carving out successful creative careers in business and fashion.
These days, Juliet runs the South Street shop with her partner Colin Herron, along with a dozen staff members.
But her kids – and their friends – still enjoy popping in whenever they are home.
How Juliet’s children have followed in her footsteps
35-year-old Catherine, who studied communications at the University of Leeds, now lives in the north of France and runs her own PR company, The Agency Collection.
Cameron, 33, who is in London, is a creative producer for designer fashion label Vivienne Westwood.
Meanwhile, Charlotte, 30, studied business management in Paris, before staying in the country to work in the fashion and football industries.
Lucy, 20, is currently studying at university in New York. She still spends her summer and Christmas holidays working in Farmore Interiors.
Juliet says: “The children kind of grew up going to trade fairs, being in the shop, seeing me working with fabrics, talking about colour.
“So they were very much involved in everything.
“They slept, ate and breathed Farmore Interiors while they were young.”
Juliet also ran a baby shop on Church Street and a clothing store on South Street for several years, although these have now closed.
Mixing parenting with working ‘7 days a week’
She says she has always been “work orientated.”
“Sometimes, I work seven days a week and late nights,” she says.
“Lucy remembers when she was little, she used to get picked up from school, and then we’d have to go and drop fabric off at the workroom and pick curtains up at the workroom.
“So they’ve definitely been through it.”
But the upshot?
They hit the ground running when they entered the world of work as adults.
Juliet says: “I’ve always had to be strong and determined.
“I’m pitching against men, I’m pitching against big companies.
“So [the children] listened to the way I would negotiate with people when I was doing things.
“And that’s given them the confidence to do that.”
She explains how this has helped her son Cameron in the project management side of his role at Vivienne Westwood.
“He gets the models, finds the locations, and organises all the fashion shows.
“He’s just come back from Mumbai. He was in Shanghai and in Paris, so he was in charge of organising everything for the fashion show.
“He’s learned that from me – the project management side of it – being organised, pulling on people’s key skills, and working with people and getting everybody to do the job on time.”
She adds: “They’ve all worked in the fashion industry, which is quite interesting as well.
“[And they are] very much about quality and about customer service.
“It’s interesting that they all went down that route.”
Farmore Interiors in St Andrews relaunches after 5-week closure
And the children have helped her too, particularly when it comes to ensuring her business thrives amid the rise of social media and digital technology.
This includes utilising Farmore Interiors’ social media channels.
“Something my son studied at university was marketing,” Juliet says.
“So he would be saying to me, ‘You need to diversify, you need to get a website, you need to get social media’.
“So they have very much pushed me with things like that.”
Juliet, who lives in Broughty Ferry, recently relaunched Farmore Interiors after five-and-a-half weeks of redecorating and refreshing the product range.
It sells everything from furniture, fabrics, lighting, wall coverings and home accessories, to baby clothes and greetings cards.
Juliet, who is in the shop every day, also offers a full property renovation and interior design service.
She says: “We completely refurbished the shop to give it a clean, fresh look.
“The aim is that we have a shop where you come in now and you don’t see things that you see everywhere else.
“You know how now, when you go to a garden centre, you see, ‘Oh that brand and that brand’.
“We’re all seeing the same things everywhere.
“So we have worked really hard going to trade fairs in Paris and going to Belgium and going to different places to find pieces that aren’t everywhere.”
Juliet’s hope that Farmore Interiors will stay in the family
To mark the occasion – and to celebrate more than 30 years in the industry – Farmore Interiors hosted a party.
This saw Catherine and Cameron, as well as his Vivienne Westwood designer fiancée Jesse, come home to St Andrews for the occasion.
Juliet’s plans for the future?
“My hope would be that one day, one of them might want to come back to Scotland.
“It’d be lovely if they wanted to come back here and take over the business.”
It’s what they’ve been trained for.
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