A businesswoman from London has beaten 700 other female founders from across the UK to win £22,000 in business support.
Anna Moynihan from Tooting is the co-founder of TaskHer, an online booking platform for tradeswomen including plumbers, electricians and heating and gas engineers.
Anna set-up the business in 2021 with her husband Paul after they noticed firsthand the gender bias in the trade industry while having work done on their home. Tradewomen across London have registered on the platform in the past two years.
Anna and Paul are now keen to expand the business nationwide, so Anna entered the ‘Female Founders’ competition run by not-for-profit business incubator, Virgin StartUp and freelance platform, Fiverr.
More than 700 businesswomen entered from across the UK and Anna was one of four selected to go through to the finals. She was paired with a business mentor for four weeks before pitching her scale-up plans to a judging panel of successful female entrepreneurs and a live audience.
As the winner, Anna will receive a free place on one of Virgin StartUp’s scale-up programmes, 16 additional hours of business mentorship and £15,000 to spend with Fiverr.
Speaking about winning the competition, Anna added: “I’m thrilled to win the Female Founders competition. As part of the competition process, I worked with a freelance from Fiverr who helped me explore the potential that AI will have on our platform and that knowledge has genuinely transformed the way we see our business growing. We couldn’t have funded this without the competition so I’m so grateful to Virgin StartUp and Fiverr for selecting TaskHer alongside three other incredible finalists. I also want to thank them for shining a light on female founders and the businesses they are building. A special thank you to my marketing mentor, Olivia Hanlon from Girls in Marketing, who was so helpful.”
One of the judges, Katie Rose, founder of marketing agency, Find Frida, commented: “Anna clearly articulated how she plans to leverage the prize money and will be sure to make a significant impact in the market. Beyond creating a platform for tradeswomen, her business will hopefully one day facilitate upskilling and training for younger women in school, demonstrating that a successful career in the trade is not only possible but incredibly rewarding.”
Bukki Adedapo, Fiverr UK Country Manager, said: “A huge congratulations to Anna and the team at TaskHer – an exceptional founder with a great business solving a real need. We are thrilled to be shining a spotlight on the fantastic work she is doing and funding her with £15,000 to spend on freelancers who can help build her business further.”
Laura Verstraeten, Head of Partnerships at Virgin StartUp, said: “Congratulations to Anna for being our winner. She is the perfect candidate to participate in one of Virgin StartUp’s growth and accelerator programmes and the team is looking forward to working with her in the coming months to support her on this journey and help TaskHer scale and thrive.”
To find out more about Virgin StartUp and the support it offers to new business founders, visit www.virginstartup.org
