I’ve personally done the duets, the four-cooks-in-the-kitchen set-up, and a few minority stakes for good measure!
Here’s what I’ve learnt: co-ownership only works when you treat it like a professional marriage; roles, money, rules, exit, not a bromance with a Companies House number.
Alliances and JV’s succeed about half the time, and most need a restructuring or an exit within five to seven years. That’s not failure; that’s reality.
The upside still makes it worth doing: the right partners buy you speed, capital, distribution, property access, technical depth, and fresh networks you can’t conjure alone. And the ventures that choose to evolve, win more often; the success rate jumps when partners actively restructure instead of freezing the original deal.
There’s also the cloud that hangs over partnerships, the fear of sharing your idea, your margin, your glory, sometimes with people you barely know. I get it. I’ve felt it.
This is why I’m sharing my partnership experience.
My first go at a partnership was at The Chester Townhouse Hotel with someone I hadn’t known very long. Yet, it worked and I believe it worked because we set the lanes on day one. She chose a hands-off, mentor/sidekick role; I took the wheel on operations and decisions.
I’m an alpha operator and I wanted to prove it in my own venue. She let me. When décor came up, it was something she enjoyed. I didn’t love every picture choice, but I respected the boundary, had respect for what she wanted to include, and we kept moving. That’s the lesson in plain English: respect each other and respect the partnership. You both need to give a little and trust that you both want what’s best for the business.
Hotel Wrexham is a different beast. Numerous directors, similar ages, plenty of confidence, and it’s a hotel investment where I know my craft. The crossover is constant and the fly-by “we should do this” comments can grate, especially when they come from outside the trenches.
Sometimes it can feel like too many cooks slows the machine and the business feels it. I still enjoy it and I back us to fix it, but it takes patience and rules.
When you jump into a four-way, you have to accept you’re not the only voice in the room. If you put money in and call yourself hands-off, be hands-off. If you put money in and want a voice, say so and own that the purse strings come with opinions. What poisons trust is claiming “just an investor” while playing shadow operator. Different leadership styles split teams quickly into “nice guys” and “hard drivers,” and fractions form if you don’t lock the standards and the decision path.
For me, shared business doesn’t make me less connected to the business. If I’m in, I like to be involved. When I’m purely an investor, I don’t enjoy it as much and I don’t pretend otherwise. That’s not a flaw; it’s knowing how I’m wired. Say you’re hands-off and then start steering from the back seat, and you’ll light a fuse under the relationship and the team.
My partner at Hotel Wrexham, lands similar conclusions from a different angle. He’ll tell you he used to guard ideas because he was worried a partner might profit without him. He learned the hard way that the right partner is the one who complement’s you, someone who steadies you in the highs, pulls you out of the lows, and covers the gaps you have.
His first partnership started as a friendship and became a business because there was balance, not just banter. He’s blunt about fairness: shares feel simple, but contribution is what counts. Partnerships drift over time; roles change, energy changes, life happens. If you keep fixating on who owns what instead of who’s doing what, resentment wins.
His bottom line is respect and reality: respect each other’s contribution. Sort any issues straight away and don’t let them fester; you don’t want your business to suffer because you or your partner are keeping quiet about something you don’t like. So what’s the advice if you’re about to jump into a venture? Proceed with caution.
Sometimes the thought and the excitement of the opportunity can overtake the real understanding of how they are as a business and you are as an individual and piece of the jigsaw. Knowing what roles each person has is so important. It’s good to have structure and an understanding of what each person can bring to the business and what each feels comfortable with.
For example, a couple of us enjoy being on the stage and networking where our other partners wouldn’t say it’s their favourite thing, so we don’t force it on them. This is a partnership where we work together and use each other’s strengths. One of them stated something that has stuck with me: without partnerships, his business life would be lonely.
He doesn’t work with family, so winning with a team matters. There’s real joy in celebrating a great month together and real relief in being able to vent to people who carry the same weight.
Go solo and you win and lose on your own. That can be noble, but it can also be brutal. Some people thrive alone; but a people person, usually thrives in a pack. I respect that. I’m wired to lead from the front, but even I know momentum is easier when the room is pulling the same way.
Let the operator operate. Let the numbers person protect the bottom line. Let the product mind obsess over the details. And when someone hates a certain kind of work, stop punishing them with it. Put them where they’ll win. That’s how you build a business that keeps moving without chewing people up.
Some advice, I got is very blunt and right: don’t assume you know a potential partner just because they’re a friend. Friendship tells you who they are on a Friday night; it doesn’t tell you who they are on payroll day. Protect the friendship by doing the professional due diligence, check references, track record, decision style, appetite for risk, and how they behave under pressure. Ask yourself the unglamorous question: if this deal strains us, do we have a way to reset gracefully or walk away clean? If the answer is no, fix that before you start.
Proceed with caution, yes, but also with intent. When the lanes are real and the respect is mutual, a partnership stops being a gamble and starts becoming a force multiplier. That’s when work feels less lonely, wins feel bigger, and the whole thing is worth the scars.
Overall, I’ve been lucky with my partnerships, and I’m honest enough to say I’m still early in most of them. Hotel Wrexham is only just past a year; DevaFest is two. Even so, the upside is real. Partnerships have pushed me faster and further than I’d managed alone. They’re risky, yes, but the right kind of risk in my opinion.
This year we hit record numbers at DevaFest and made serious strides at Hotel Wrexham. That didn’t happen by accident; it came from complementary brains, shared graft, and a structure we keep tightening.
If you’re on the fence or looking to get into a business partnership, ask yourself one brutal question: could you work with this person on their worst day, and could they work with you on yours? If the answer is yes, then go for it.
