Ray Spooner MCIOB MRICS
I can help you with your business
​
People come to me to help them with their business because I have a forty -year proven track record of bulding my own businesses.
​
In those forty - years ive only made a loss in one financial year, and that was early on when I bought my two partners out. Apart from that, good or great profits every year. I can help you understand how to do the same.
My time in business has given me the ability to talk with a business owner and identify reasonably quickly what area of their business needs attention.
This is because at a high level businesses are much the same, they all need sales and to make profit, a Profit & Loss account and a Balance sheet. The product is the only dirrerence. So, through some strategic questioning I am able able to hone in on the issue. The result is often a financial issue, but that is not often the cause. The cause I have found in all cases, is lack of the right skills.
​
UPDATE
More and more businesses are wanting to work with me so I have decided to start running short (and not so short) business courses. For example, "Essental Business Finances for Business Owners". These will be inperson and coming as soon as I can get the website and course material written. Courses will be held in Royston, Hertfordshire.
​
​
How I can be of service to you
Business Expert, Family Business Expert, Property Expert, Investor, Mentor and Author
​
Ray is an ex carpenter, joiner and furniture maker. He joined the family business at age 22 and took over at age 28. He grew the business alone, then later with his five sons to what it is today, a third-generation £14m plus professionally run, profitable and sustainable, main contracting business. The business now in its forty-third year employs over fifty people, plus many sub-contractors, operating from two offices in Bishop Stortford and Cambridge.
​
Ray withdrew from his business in 2018 passing his shares to his sons, taking up a chairman/mentoring role. Then setting-up Carmelcrest Homes, a property development/investment company which now has a large portfolio in the Midlands. Also now managed by two of Ray’s sons.
​
With the benefit of more time Ray became involved in helping other business people achieve their goals, and this was so successful and rewarding that it has become Rays full time passion.
​Ray learned early on that the key to growing a business is to first educate yourself with the required business skills. Using those skills, install systems in the business that are one-step-ahead of the stage of the business. Continue to build systems to facilitate new growth. Businesses often grow, but without the systems to support the growth!
​
​Ray is a dedicated life-long-learner and believes in constant personal development. He is a Chartered Builder (MCIOB), Chartered Surveyor (MRICS) and an NLP master practitioner. His Masters dissertation was in family-run businesses, which has come in very useful, as the company is now very much family run. He is also a qualified personal trainer and has a diploma in nutrition, living a very healthy lifestyle.
​
Rays mantra is, "If you want more, you have to become more". By Jim Rohn.
​
​He has a great interest in Human Psychology and Biology and how this knowledge can empower business owners to better manage and motivate their team.
​Ray is author of three business books. 50 Skills - The Entrepreneurs Handbook. A book of 50 key skills Ray has learned in his thirty-five years plus in business. His second book titled The School leavers Guide to Money is aimed at young people to give them the money skills they should have learned at school. His recent book is The Art of Construction Estimating, a training manual for those wishing to pursue a career as a building estimator; with all the tips and tricks.
​
Ray is an award willing business man. He was the NatWest Bank Entrepreneur of the year 2000. The Docklands Business Club, Business of Tomorrow winner 2001 and regularly appeared on the Learning Zone on TV. He was regularly invited to speak at the University of East London to other businesses on various business topics.
​
Ray was a board Member on the learning and Skills Council and was used as an exemplary construction business by the Department of Trade and Industry, used as a case study for how a construction business should be run. Carmelcrest was the first business in the South East to become BS 5750. The forerunner to ISO 9001.