Accelerator Programmes • Webinar
We hosted our sixth lunchtime How to Breakout in 2026 session, all around how to get money and investment for your beauty brand. Thank you to all the founders that joined and came with questions.
Paul Finch, Nicole Scola (HSBC Innovation Banking) and Ciara Byrne (Vestra Partners) tackled the questions founders are too afraid to ask out loud. Bank or investor? Debt or equity? Am I even ready to raise? Two very different perspectives on capital – and more alignment than you might expect.
Here’s what was covered:
- The three milestones Ciara uses to tell if a founder is actually ready to raise — and why 40% repeat purchase rate is where the VC conversation really opens up.
- Why investors don’t want to fund your inventory. And what debt and working capital actually exist to do instead.
- The cap table maths that founders get wrong: why giving away 30% at seed can quietly kill your Series A before you’ve even started building for it.
- The SEIS and EIS schemes that UK founders should be using – and why it’s one advantage the US simply doesn’t have.
- Why Ciara actively tells founders not to raise. Not to be contrarian. Because capital raised on weak foundations just papers over the problem.
And Ciara’s line on capital that stuck with the room?
“The brands that struggle are the ones who raise to figure it out. Capital amplifies what is already there — both the good and the bad.”
Watch the full recording below.
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