From sport science to start up success: Matt Connelly's entrepreneurial journey

Matt Connelly started ihateironing from his bedroom in 2014, and has since grown the company into becoming the leading dry-cleaning service. Prior to this, Matt established Shoreditch’s first co-working space, The Hatchery, and developed an entrepreneurship network of 12 East London universities. He also led the Tech City Bootcamps for Digital Entrepreneurs.

I graduated from Leeds Beckett University in 2001 with a BSc (Hons) Sport and Exercise Science. Pursuing this degree definitely set me up for a more analytical approach to the entrepreneurial work I went on to do after graduating, and which eventually led me to founding ihateironing as my own start-up.

Understanding the process for scientific research taught me to have a certain rigour and data-driven approach to my work, which has been key to many aspects of my entrepreneurial journey. Additionally, I took learnings from sports psychology, particularly learnings about winning teams, and applied them to our business here - which I believe has helped paved the way for our current growth and success as a business.

After graduating from LBU, I followed up with a postgraduate course in Dublin before starting my career. I set off on my entrepreneurial journey by working in several small business ventures helping other people establish, develop, and grow their start-ups. In the eight years that I did this, I also founded and managed a variety of start-up programmes, which included the first coworking space in Shoreditch/Tech City sphere.

One of the biggest challenges I faced, on a personal level, was taking that first leap of leaving my steady income and pursuing my own business idea. Without large personal or family wealth it was very difficult to take the decision to stop work and have no income. I managed to get a small amount of money and cut my costs right down to afford me the opportunity to go full time - because I really believed in it.

Now, nearly 10 years later, ihateironing has grown from the initial two-person team it was when I first started to a network of leading dry-cleaning experts in several major UK cities, as well as across the pond in New York City. We’ve just recently passed 1,000,000 orders - a milestone which felt incomprehensible when we were barely doing 10 orders a week.

A moment of truth for me as a founder, as well as for the business as a whole, was our ability to come out of the pandemic 10 times stronger. After losing 70% of our revenue in the first 3 days of the pandemic, I adapted the business model to offer people what they really needed during those trying times: essential grocery boxes. The entire team came together as we shifted the business, and we were able to maintain a steady revenue for our dry cleaning partners, and push the business to the next level. In 2022, I was awarded the Entrepreneur of the Year award at the British Business Awards for my role in guiding ihateironing through the pandemic and supporting all of our dry cleaning partners throughout such unprecedented times.

Alongside investing in making the business better - not just bigger - over the years, I also invested time and resources into establishing local and environmental initiatives to make sure we can use our network and influence for a good cause. Our Brixton Library Workwear Scheme, as well as our range of eco-friendly initiatives, have both been recognised in the prestigious Business Culture Awards and led to us being shortlisted for the Best CSR and Social Responsibility category alongside industry leaders like PwC and Lloyds Banking Group.