How I made it: Jimmy Metta Founder of Vanquish Wine
He decided to start a trading business and began by buying high-tech electronic products such as plasma television screens and DVD players direct from factories in China and trying to sell them by word of mouth.
It was slow going, however. “I started shifting a bit of stock here and there but people were a bit sceptical about buying a £3,000 plasma screen from some guy who had just started a business. It was tough.”
After a year of doing this Metta got a lucky break. An uncle who lived in Switzerland asked if he would like to help sell part of his wine collection. Metta agreed to give it a go and, armed with a list of the wines, started cold-calling wine merchants in London to see if they would be interested in buying some.
He soon hit a problem. “My uncle collected only first-growth Bordeaux wines and when I started listing the wines to the merchants over the phone some of them thought I was fraudulent. They thought the wines were too good to be true and didn’t want to touch them.”
So Metta rang Christies auction house, which agreed to auction some of the wines. The sale went well and Metta decided to stop importing electronic goods and focus on wine. In 2004 he started up a company called Vanquish Merchants using £5,000 of his own money and £45,000 put up by his father and brother in return for equity.
He began by selling the rest of his uncle’s wine collection but soon realised he needed to start buying wine of his own if he was to turn the venture into a proper business. He, too, decided to focus solely on first-growth wines from Bordeaux.
“It was a big gamble because I didn’t quite know what I was doing, but I had a good feeling,” said Metta.
His first purchase was a magnum of 1961 Chateau Petrus for £5,000. Within two days Metta had sold the bottle for £7,000, making himself a £2,000 profit. He was hooked.
He started buying more wine from the same supplier and business grew. Metta soon started selling champagne too after seeing large numbers of people in night-clubs ordering expensive champagne such as Cristal and Dom Perignon.
By 2005 business was going so well Metta brought in a partner, David Elghanayan, to help him, giving him a stake in the business in return for investment. The two of them formed Vanquish Wine and made it their mission to sell champagne to all the top clubs in London. Helped by the fact that he speaks four languages, Metta discovered he could undercut his rivals by buying the champagne for a lower price from distributors in Europe, known as the “grey” market, instead of buying it from the exclusive distributor in Britain.
“I was buying so much Cristal champagne that if a club called up at 2am saying it needed 120 bottles immediately, we would get in our cars and deliver it,” said Metta. “I was buying everything I could find, whether it was in Germany or Belgium. I would call suppliers I didn’t know and wire them the money the same day.”
His decision to always pay people immediately helped. “We had enough capital not to ask for any credit, and in this business that goes a long way,” he said.
Then one day he got a call from Moet Hennessy, which owns the Dom Perignon and Moet & Chandon brands, asking Metta for a meeting. “They said I was taking a lot of business away from them and that it was unacceptable,” he said.
After meeting them, Metta agreed to buy direct from Moet Hennessy but only on the condition that they match the prices he had been getting in the grey market.
For Metta it was great news. It meant he had a regular supply of champagne and did not have to chase around Europe buying up odd bottles. He soon started supplying spirits, too, and has created a brand management division to launch other people’s new products in London’s clubs and bars. As a result, this year Vanquish Wine is expected to have sales of £8.5m.
Metta, who has a 40% stake in the business, said the recession has quelled people’s enthusiasm for buying expensive champagne in clubs, but they are simply trading down to cheaper quality brands, which his firm also supplies.
“People don’t want to stay at home and be depressed and sad. The low-end brands in the luxury category are flying through the roof.”
Still only 29, Metta thinks that being so young has been an advantage. He has this advice to give other young entrepreneurs. “You really need to care about what you are doing and be passionate about what you are trying to achieve. And you need to understand your market very well. You don’t succeed in any business if you don’t know what you are doing.”