Best Startup
I’m Craig Unsworth, Co-CEO at Loytech. Loytech is the company behind Mór, the home of premium independent premium brands. Mór helps people find values-led independent businesses that believe in what they believe in.
We are members-only; with individual members and corporate members having access to our platform, where they can save 10-50% on everything they buy.
Tell us about yourself?
My background is in innovation and digital transformation.
I spent the 2000s and 2010s helping founders and management teams transform their companies using technology then build to a capital event.
After a handful of successful exits I wanted to build something from scratch and set out to do so with my co-founder Urchana Moudgil.
If you could go back in time a year or two, what piece of advice would you give yourself?
I’d go back to 2019-2020 when we spent the best part of two years building a powerful technology platform that could have transformed the world of flight and hotel upgrades.
Alas, getting ready to launch in the first half of 2020 proved the worst possible timing.
A really important life lesson – timing is everything – we pivoted on the same core idea and started Loytech.
The other primary lesson learned, as painful as it was at the time, was the importance of diversifying your business to, if you can, work across multiple sectors and verticals.
What problem does your business solve?
Our core revenue comes from corporate membership – which we sell to enterprise clients as a Customer Loyalty tool (where they give their customers membership) and large employers as an Employee Loyalty mechanic (where they give their employees membership). In each scenario we offer a values-led and principles-based solution in a world of mass-market options.
We’re not for everyone but we’ve found specific traction with companies that want to be clear about what they stand for. Loyalty is no longer about a free coffee here or there or a scrappy discount code you’d find online anyway – Mór helps our clients give something more valuable back to their customers and teams.
What is the inspiration behind your business?
Whilst COVID-19 brought many (many!) clouds, there were several silver linings too.
One of which was seeing how much emphasis people put (back) on the importance of shopping locally, supporting independent brands, and choosing carefully who they spend their money with.
The idea of quality over quantity also returned to mainstream thinking after a couple of decades of sheer consumptionism.
We have built a platform that responds to all of those things – proving that life’s little luxuries needn’t cost the earth or one’s principles
What is your magic sauce?
We give customers a platform to shop consciously, make a difference and buy from brands that support what you support.
We believe we have curated the ultimate brand portfolio focusing on upwards of 20 different ‘badges’ which give users a unique insight into the independent brands they are supporting. A vegan member can easily find brands that are vegan friendly.
Someone who cares about sustainability can pick from products that have been made in the UK, browse businesses that operate within the circular economy, or choose to buy from a brand that is zero plastic, female-owned (50% of the brands on our platform are female-led businesses) POC-led, or LGBTQ+ Friendly.
We have a number of core beliefs that run through everything we do at Mór: sustainability, equality, diversity and accessibility.
What is the plan for the next 5 years? What do you want to achieve?
We now have hundreds of independent brands on Mór.
We’ve got incredible companies led by women, you can search for POC-owned businesses, you’ll find vegan-friendly products, we feature sustainable experiences, and every time you shop you know that not only are you saving money you’re also helping a small business grow.
Our plan for the next few years is to keep adding to this mix to make Mór the natural go-to for treats, gifts, and the unusual – all whilst helping people shop consciously.
What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far?
We’re building a business for a post-pandemic world, which we set up in a midst-pandemic period, after being totally ambushed by the pandemic’s onset.
To have lived through three eras in just one year has meant we’ve really had to focus on agility, flexibility, and – as obvious as it may sound – listening to what the market wants next.
So many things that we’re doing now are different to how we’d have done them even five years ago so we’ve had to simultaneously squeeze in a lot of learning, adaptation, and innovation.
How do people get involved/buy into your vision?
I think – genuinely – that most people stand for what we stand for.
There will always be a part of society that doesn’t care about values as much, will only buy the cheapest mass-produced ‘stuff’, is not bothered about where things come from or who sells them, or isn’t thinking about sustainability when they shop.
But most people do care. And we’ve been delighted at the response – both from consumers using the platform and the clients we work with on corporate membership – we’ve had so far
