A post-lockdown problem for the Real Eating Company solved thanks to Revolut Business

Helena Hudson, Founder of The Real Eating Company, shares her story about how Revolut Business helped her to solve an unexpected problem for her regional teams.

What is The Real Eating Company?

The Real Eating Company is an independent cafe and coffee shop chain, bringing classic British food and drink into towns and cities across the South of England. Their regional roots mean they have forged strong relationships with like-minded makers of high-quality British produce. Over the last few years, they have seen a particular trend towards customers supporting their local independents more than ever before and this trend has accelerated post lockdown. As well as good quality local food and drink, sustainability has always been an important part of what they do. All their packaging is 100% plant-based and fully biodegradable. Much of their shop fit-outs are re-purposed from existing fittings and fixtures. The company was founded by Helena Hudson twelve years ago and remains privately-owned, with expansion funded organically.

What are our challenges?

Before the lockdown, each cafe and coffee shop accepted cash and contactless payments. As each site opened post-lockdown, they moved to 100% contactless payment. Aside from reducing the risk of transmitting the virus through cash handling, moving to 100% contactless payment had other benefits to the business including removing the cost of paying in cash to our bank and also allowing clear visibility on transactions.

However, there was an unforeseen problem with not having cash on the premises any longer.

Previously, each site would use cash to pay for local expenses. This could be for anything from flowers and newspapers to paying local trades people or topping up stock items if they were unexpectedly busy.

Team members were calling in to ask for a quick resolution. Could they hold some cash on site to pay for these things? The firm didn’t want to go back to having cash on the premises. So they investigated the options and a pre-paid debit card with a controlled (small) cash limit seemed to be the solution.

This had to be put in place quickly so that each team could operate their site to standard and without unnecessary interruption. They contacted their primary bank without success. They approached a digital bank but were told that pre-paid debit cards could only be used on a personal account and with limited cards.

And then we discovered Revolut

They turned to Revolut Business and quickly realised that a solution existed for them. After a straightforward process to open a business bank account, they had debit cards with a pre-paid limit on each, within two weeks.  

Outcome

Helena Hudson adds: "Thanks to Revolut Business, an unexpected problem post-lockdown was solved for us which other banks couldn’t help us with. Opening an account was straightforward and fast.  I can see that traditional banks will become more challenged in the future as businesses like ours become less cash-reliant and can move more easily now to a digital platform. Having real-time visibility on what each site is spending now is an added bonus, too."