15 lessons from 15 years of Theo Paphitis' Small Business Sunday

Each year, Theo Paphitis hosts the Small Business Sunday winner’s event to celebrate small businesses and give them a boost.

It’s a brilliantly inspiring day where Theo and a line-up of speakers share lessons, practical advice, and lots and lots of encouragement.

You come away feeling enthused and supported, because you’re reminded why you started, and you’re in a room full of people who get it.

This year marked 15 years of Small Business Sunday (SBS) and the theme of the day was ‘Resilience Rocks.’

In this blog post and podcast episode, I’m sharing my 15 lessons from the day from Theo, Katie Piper who did the fireside chat, from the small business panel, and from Kypros Kyprianou, CEO of the Theo Paphitis Retail Group, and the host of the SBS conference.

Katie Piper is a British author, presenter and charity founder of The Katie Piper Foundation who survived a horrific acid attack in 2008 that completely changed her life.

After extensive surgery, she spoke publicly about what had happened to her, sharing her story in a Channel 4 documentary and later in bestselling books.

She went on to set up the Katie Piper Foundation, which supports burns survivors with specialist rehabilitation and emotional support, in St Helen’s, Merseyside.

Katie was the perfect person to talk about resilience, as someone who has turned something devastating into something that now helps thousands of other people rebuild their lives.

Topics and timings:

0.20 - Episode outline.

1.55 - Sponsor message - 2026 planner.

3.02 - What is the SBS conference?

4.12 - The benefits of being in the SBS community.

5.16 - 15 years of SBS and the theme, resilience and what that means.

7.29 - About my in person event the day before.

11.05 - Lesson 1 - business is lonely.

11.56 - Lesson 2 - things will go wrong

12.31 - Lesson 3 - learn from your mistakes

12.52 - Lesson 4 - don't do a half tackle

13.43 - Lesson 5 - keep talking about your business