Both the personal and professional came crashing down for Beccy Dickinson, 46, from Sevenoaks, in 2023.
Her print business needed to be liquidated and at the same time, her marriage came to an end. Even more difficult, was the fact they ran their business together.
‘We were together for 21 years and over time just grew apart,’ Beccy tells Metro. ‘We’d built a life, a business, and a family together, but as we grew individually, we realised we wanted different things from the next chapter.
‘It wasn’t explosive or dramatic… more a gradual shift that we both acknowledged with mutual respect.’
So amicable was their split, that the divorcees decided to team up on another venture, launching a brand new company while going through divorce proceedings.
Beccy and her ex-husband run their new six-figure business, Branded Biophilia, together, and they’ve worked with Google, Instagram, Netflix, and a host of other household names. The company makes living walls for brands, creating plant installations for both indoor and outdoor venues.
The move from traditonal print marketing to creating bespoke living walls was promted by a previous client.
‘Prior to liquidating our first business, we had a client come to us asking for a logo on a living wall, and so that’s what we did,’ Beccy explains, noting that they spotted a growing trend and a gap in the market.
‘We thought, “we can do this”, and live in a place where we’re in the country so we’ve got space to grow plants and keep the plants – along with all the printing equipment which we already had. It felt like something we could manage.’
The pair went to Portugal to map out the ‘nitty gritty’ of what their new business model would be. It was also on this trip that the pair decided to end their marriage, but to continue working together as a team professionally.
‘We were best friends for a long time, so if you can make it work then you should try,’ Beccy says.
‘I was definitely the yin to his yang, and our strengths naturally balanced each other out. The business has been a shared passion and something bigger than either of us personally.
‘Continuing to collaborate just made sense – we wanted to protect what we’d built and keep creating work we were proud of.’
Friends and family weren’t surprised by this decision, as they knew how much it meant to both of them. There was even some admiration that they could separate the personal from the professional.
It hasn’t always been easy working together, though.
‘It’s become harder over time. In the beginning, there was a sense of familiarity that made it feel manageable, but as our lives have become more separate — new partners, new priorities, financial boundaries — the dynamic naturally changes.
‘It takes constant adjustment and communication, which isn’t always easy when emotions or practicalities overlap. That said, there’s still a deep respect for what we built together, and I think that’s what keeps it professional, even when it’s challenging.’
Beccy, her ex-husband and his cousin run the entire business together, and they’ve largely relied on word of mouth to grow and thrive.
‘We were lucky we had so many contacts in the industry, so we could build up quickly,’ she says. ‘It’s been a good journey. It’s a niche idea, but it is lucrative.’
Getting to this point hasn’t been easy though. The pair’s first business began to stuggle in the aftermath of the pandemic.
‘I’m ashamed to say, and it’s a big lesson I’ve learned from, we had our eggs in one basket considerably with one big client. We had other clients, but this big one went to three months on their payment terms and with a couple of other clients doing the same thing, we ended up not being able to manage. We had over £100,000 owed to us.
‘The money isn’t coming in, but it’s still going out. It’s awful – you don’t know where to turn in that situation because you’ve got HMRC chasing you, staff and clients. All of that never stops and it’s a stressful place to be.’
Beccy’s mental health hit rock bottom. She started to take antidepressants and thinks she made some ‘bad decisions’ due to stress, including taking on business loans worth over £60,000 before high interest rates.
‘It paid off some of the debt and sank us anyway,’ she says. ‘When you get to that point, it doesn’t make a dent. I think there’s a misunderstanding around liquidation – I think some people believe the directors may come out better off than everyone else, and I can assure you we did not.’
Beccy struggled with the stress of letting down colleagues and business associates who’d become friends, and the pain of being unable to look after staff. At that point, they liquidated and quickly put their efforts into Branded Biophilia, building a workshop at the back of their home.
Beccy was paying attention to the growing sustainability conversation happening off the back of Covid, and she wanted to build a business that kept these things top of mind.
She doesn’t build plastic/artificial green walls for instance, for which she gets so many requests she claims that if she had a pound for every time she’s asked for one, she’d be set.
No plants are thrown away, everything is reused and working in a circular way is a priority.
Her favourite project so far was working for Unhidden, an adaptive fashion brand for people with disabilities, for one of their London Fashion Week shows.
‘They asked for a wall and it was special. I always wanted to go into fashion, fashion was my thing. Ironically, my daughter is now at fashion college. So I just found myself standing in front of the most beautiful wall I think I’ve ever done and thinking “wow, I can’t believe it, I’ve made it to London Fashion Week”, albeit through a different channel.’
For Beccy, the key is to keep moving forward and to focus on the future – being stuck on the past never helped anyone create new opportunities.
‘I had never realised this was my calling, until I did it. I love nature and trees, but this business wasn’t something I yearned to do. But I decided to say “yes” and take the opportunity.’
