Kat speaks to entrepreneur Charlotte Carter, who shares how she built multiple businesses, from her successful bag brand Carter Bags to developing a new collagen supplement business. Kat and Charlotte explore entrepreneurship, resilience, mental health and the power of movement, giving advice on creating habits, building confidence, overcoming overwhelm and creating success on your own terms.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Charlotte discovered that taking calculated risks and developing positive habits became her route to change. Despite criticism from those around her, she consistently found success by trusting her instincts and embracing uncertainty.
Throughout her entrepreneurship, Charlotte learned to recognise when something wasn't serving her anymore.
After struggling with mood fluctuations throughout her life, Charlotte sought help and received a PMDD diagnosis. This meant she could address her mental health through proper support, supplements and exercise, dramatically improving her focus and emotional balance.
Running has helped Charlotte in many ways, not just physically but for mental clarity too. She discovered that around the 6-7 kilometre mark, her mind finally quieted, allowing her to escape the constant mental load of business and life.
Charlotte's approach to managing overwhelm evolved through necessity. She developed a system of creating detailed lists on her phone that help her compartmentalise problems and develop actionable solutions when she feels most stressed.
The ripple effect of positive habits became evident in Charlotte's life when she noticed running also decreased her desire for alcohol and improved her nutrition choices, creating a cycle of well being.
When launching her bag business, Charlotte faced significant scepticism about entering a competitive market but despite limited resources, she created a unique product that influenced high street designs.
Charlotte's experience building multiple businesses taught her that overwhelm cannot be tackled all at once. She learned to prioritise problems, compartmentalise challenges, and create space for clear thinking.
BEST MOMENTS
"I've always found that being in periods of my life where I found myself being really unhappy is where I've taken the biggest risks and people have said to me, 'You should not be doing that,' and I've totally ignored them and done it and good's always come out of it."
"I can overcome everything, but the reason why we feel like we can't is because we get overwhelmed and we get in a state of panic and stress. When you are in that state of stress, you can't think outside the box, you can't look at different solutions."
"Your imagination is a preview of life's upcoming attractions... If you can't stop thinking about something, it's this kind of prod to say, look, you need to pay some attention to this."
"I think we're not very good at reading those signs. Like if we get a feeling inside of ourselves... my body's been telling me things and I haven't listened to it because I haven't known how to listen to it."
"One thing I've noticed, it isn't until I get to about six or seven kilometres that I start to realise my brain's gone quiet and I'm just focused on breathing, and I'm focused on just putting one foot in front of the other."
ABOUT THE GUEST
Charlotte launched CarterBags.com on shoestring budget and have generated thousands of sales through organic LinkedIn marketing. She started CarterBags.com to solve the age old problem of not being able to find a practical and stylish ladies’ laptop bags which are also chic.Through growing her own business she has developed a wealth of knowledge around digital marketing including personal branding, social media, social selling, SEO, Shopify design & build, product design, analytics and has an extensive background in sales 💖 which naturally led to the launch of MadAsaBoxOfFrogs.co.uk her marketing agency.In my quest to learn more about product based businesses she has launched a produc