‘Accidental’ Sussex side hustle grows into multi-million-pound business | Personal Finance | Finance
What started with a handful of discarded sheets of labels rescued from a factory bin has grown into a thriving Sussex-based manufacturer with a global client list. A4 Labels, now led by 25-year-old Charlie Hawker, was a “side hustle” launched by “accident” in 2010.
Today, the multi-million-pound company operates with a team of eight and supplies clients including Lush, Nando’s, Warner Brothers, and The Card Factory, alongside dozens of artisan producers across the UK. Charlie, managing director of A4 Labels, told Express.co.uk that it was his father, Colin, who launched the business almost by chance. He said: “My dad started it by accident. His old school friends owned a label company… when he was visiting his friend’s factory, he saw him chucking some A4 sheets of stickers in the bin and Dad said, ‘Don’t chuck them, I’ll sell them on eBay’. He sold them quite quickly, so he went back and asked for some more.”
Operating initially from the family’s spare bedroom, Colin began selling labels online with Charlie helping out. He said: “When I was maybe 10 or 11 years old, I would go down and help count 20 sheets of paper into envelopes to take them to the post box around the corner.”
Within a year, the first website was launched, and in 2011, A4Labels.com was registered as a company – the domain name proving crucial to its early growth.
As the business grew, Charlie’s mother insisted that the boxes of labels could no longer take over their family home. This led to the establishment of a small office on the coast in Lancing, West Sussex.
Charlie formally joined the company part-time after college in 2018 and gradually prepared to take the reins completely, studying business management at university.
The business “boomed” during the pandemic, at one point producing four million sheets of labels per week.
Revenues peaked at £2.25million but have since returned to just under £2million as post-pandemic demand stabilised.
Charlie said A4 Labels’ speed of service is one of the business’s strong points. He said: “If you order before 4pm, you’ll have it the next day from us. Being able to keep large stocks and having a team where everyone can do a bit of everything has kept us ahead.”
Touching on the company culture, Charlie added: “Labelling is an incredibly boring industry. I need the staff to have fun and feel involved. I won’t tell them what to do – I’ll tell them what needs to happen and let them decide. If they’re involved in decision-making, they feel more worth in the company.”
That ethos extends to corporate responsibility. Since 2024, A4 Labels has donated 1% of sales to Seven Clean Seas, an initiative that removes plastic from oceans.
Charlie said: “I always think it’s important – being a business, you’ve got more responsibility than just making profit. Living by the coast, you really see the impact of pollution. We’ve already cleaned over a ton of plastic out of the oceans with them.”
Looking ahead, Colin remains involved as a “non-executive chairman”, while Charlie prepares the company for global expansion.
He said: “The whole industry’s been in a bit of a rut recently, but I think we’re primed to get out of it. We’ve built an American website already, and Australia is showing a bit of potential as we’re getting a few orders from there. The future really is about having some global dominance.”
Reflecting on the journey from spare-room side hustle to multimillion-pound enterprise, Charlie said: “I remember a postbag and two DPD parcels on our doorstep that Dad posted on Facebook as our busiest ever day. Now I’ve filmed us loading seven cages of DHL at the factory. The contrast is just great. I just want to take it to the next level.”
