Two years ago Lisa Mather left her role as an IT consultant and together with her business partner David McGarty, an established kitchen designer, opened MODO Cucine. MODO specialises in mid to high end kitchens, with Miele and Bontempi as its main suppliers, as well as sourcing natural stone for use in kitchens and interiors. Mather took time out of her busy schedule at the Cheshire based showroom to tell us about her typical day...

5:45am   I try to run most mornings with a friend around the village of Knutsford where I live and on those days I'm up at around 5.45am. I'm back home by 6.15am in time to grab a shower and breakfast. Breakfast is my main meal of the day so I eat lots of different things like fruit, cereal, toast, boiled egg and yoghurt - food that will keep me going all day. I have about a 25-minute drive to work so I get to the showroom at around 8.30am most days.

8.30am   The day really gets going about now. Although my background is in IT consultancy my family has always been involved in the stone industry and property development and it was always in the back of my mind to get involved myself one day. Our revenue breakdown is probably 70% to 30% in favour of kitchens and that's David's specialist area while I deal with the stone side and oversee the general running of the business, alongside our part-time administrator Vicky. The business couldn't survive without someone to deal with all the behind the scenes tasks.

10:00am   Mornings tend to be the busiest part of the day. I spend most of my first two working hours going through the stack of emails that seem to have appeared overnight. The phone constantly rings with calls from a variety of people ranging from clients to suppliers. Our fitters tend to pop in the showroom of a morning to collect drawings or to have a chat with us about the projects they're working on. 

12:00pm    David and I obviously spend a lot of time out of the showroom dealing with our customers so lunch isn't really an option. We like to visit our projects at least once a day. Each day is different and that's what's so great about running this business. We're both surrounded by what we love, so coming to work is a real joy for us.

1:00pm   We're situated just off the main high street in Bramhall, a wealthy area of Cheshire, next door to a busy restaurant called Piccolino's. It creates a real buzz on the high street and seems to bring a lot of people into the showroom which is fantastic. Our key displays are in the front window, visible to passers-by, but there are also a variety of other displays inside that show what we're capable of here. We like to do more face-to-face marketing rather than just blanket advertising so we try to organise showroom events, such as wine tasting evenings and live cooking demos, every six months. It gets people talking about us and helps generates sales.

3:00pm   If we're lucky we have time for a quick mid-afternoon coffee. We opened the showroom with just Miele de Kuche furniture and appliances and then last year we introduced Bontempi, an Italian furniture company, to offer another quality product but at a different price level. We wanted to maximise our sales based on our current customer footfall and we've also introduced ranges of ceramic and porcelain tiles. It's tough for everyone at the moment, we've certainly seen changes in footfall and business overall, but on the plus side we've been inundated with orders since Christmas and we're still going strong. In fact, our enquiry book is double or triple what it was last January. The difficult part is turning those enquiries into actual sales.

5:00pm   The showroom closes at 5pm but I rarely leave then, in fact I'm normally here any time between 6.30pm and 8pm. Each day I write myself a to do list and try to get as many of those ticked off before the end of the day.

7:30pm   I often leave at about 7.30pm and aim to get home about 8pm most nights. My boyfriend works similar hours so we make a point of cooking dinner together when we get home, usually with a bottle of wine, and that gives us a chance to discuss our day. 

10:00pm   Spare time is limited but I do like to make time for holiday's and my boyfriend and I try to ski once or twice a year. During the week, I'm usually in bed by 10pm. Occasionally I'll take the laptop home to get through more emails, but apart from that my evenings are generally quite relaxing.