On February the 21st of this year, I was in Boston, USA. There was a snow storm and I was in an UBER shuttle on my way to the airport. It was very early and I hadn’t had a coffee yet, so I was extremely surprised my brain was working. But it was on fire. To the shock of the driver and fellow passenger,
I suddenly burst out and cried “Oh my god, that is an amazing idea!”
They asked me what I was talking about and I told them my early vision of the OURTOR App, realising as I was talking for all I knew I could be sitting next to Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook or Dara Khosrowshahi of UBER, so maybe shouldn’t have, but hey-ho. Later that day, I called my wife and said “I’ve had a brilliant idea!” “Another one?” she teased. I come up with stuff all the time, but this was a sticker. Before I left on my trip, my wife actually told me that I was going to have a business idea that would change my life. She was right.
Flash forward to June this year, Gabriel Moon and I are sitting around the kitchen table and are working on the prototype app for OURTOR. I had secured some potential investment and had struck a deal of sweat equity for 20% of the company with my brother in-law, who runs a web and app developing company. Sadly, this didn’t work out because he’d lost a big contract and couldn’t afford the time and extra expense, so Gabriel valiantly offered to learn on the job and set to developing the app.
Jump to October, again in my kitchen, now we have Michael onboard. Michael Hanby is an old Glastonbury friend going back many years and many festivals. I first spoke to Michael after he’d set himself up as a business advisor and met with him to help me with Tor’s Tours. I was extremely impressed with his business knowhow, but couldn’t afford his services at the time. He has now come onboard with OURTOR as an advisor on sweat equity he is an extremely valuable asset to OURTOR.
Now, November 25th and we are moving full steam ahead. We have moved out of the kitchen and have scored an amazing office owned by Michael Eavis of Glastonbury Festival. On securing the office, Michael asked me what I was currently doing. I told him I was a tour guide, to which he laughed “Oh, like Jamie George (another local tour guide), walking backwards round the Tor!” People of Glastonbury are known for their strange behaviour, so I simply said yes. I imagine what I do might look a little strange to an outsider. I do tours of the labyrinth on the slopes of the Tor, where we walk 3 ½ hours one way then turn around and walk 3 ½ hours the opposite way, weaving our way in and out of the labyrinth. However, strange as it may look, this is the only way to find out which secrets the labyrinth holds.
Our cosy little office offers a space where Gabriel can crack on with developing the app and I can quietly work on the blog, make connections and envision more plans for the future. Watch this space for more exciting news to follow.
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cheers, Tor Wesbster.