Some professional relationships begin with a formal introduction, a carefully prepared brief or an enquiry about a new website. Others begin with someone entering just about every competition you ever run. Many years ago, when we were running Didsbury Life, our website for the independent businesses in the area, we got to know a local business owner called Zoë.
Zoë ran Vintage Afternoon Teas and was a particularly enthusiastic participant in our competitions. We became familiar with her name long before we started working together professionally. She also promoted her business through Didsbury Life, and over time, what began as a connection through the local business community developed into a working relationship.
We designed the Vintage Afternoon Teas website. At the time, it was simply another project for a local independent business. We certainly had no idea that it would be the beginning of a connection that would continue through different businesses, different locations and quite a few years.
a change of direction
Some time later, Zoë decided to retrain as a reflexologist. A new business meant a new identity, and we found ourselves working together again, this time creating the branding and website for her reflexology practice. Meanwhile, Vintage Afternoon Teas hadn’t disappeared. Zoë sold the business to Sharon, who continued to develop it, and who we still work with today. One business had changed hands. Another had been established. And we had somehow remained connected to both.
It’s one of those things you don’t particularly notice while it’s happening. You’re simply getting on with the work, responding to enquiries, designing websites and helping businesses with whatever they need. Only when you look back do you begin to see how the different threads connect.
different places, familiar connections
Life moved on.
Zoë relocated to Devon, where she continued her reflexology practice for a time before eventually moving in another direction. We moved too. First from Manchester to Croatia, where we spent seven years, and then to our current home in Andalucía. Throughout those changes, we kept in touch. And when Zoë subsequently became involved with the Association of Reproductive Reflexologists, she occasionally contacted Pete for technical assistance with their website. One enquiry led to another, and eventually the Association became a We Are Life client.
So here we are, all these years after those early Didsbury Life competitions, working together again. Different business, different circumstances, but a familiar connection. And Vintage Afternoon Teas? Still part of our working lives, too.
funny how things work out
When we think back to our Didsbury Life days, we remember the many independent businesses and people we encountered through the website. Some became clients. Some became friends. Some moved away, changed careers or took their businesses in completely different directions. A surprising number of those connections have continued, often in ways we could never have anticipated.
It’s not something we ever set out to engineer. And we certainly couldn’t have predicted that a familiar name appearing regularly in our competition entries would still be part of our working world all these years later. But that’s often how things happen.
Businesses evolve. People move. Circumstances change. Occasionally, paths cross again. And sometimes, they never really separate in the first place.