A NORTHWICH company that began at a baby swimming class is well on its way to becoming a national franchise success story.

Entrepreneurs Caroline Gowing and Vicky Matthews met during their daughters’ swimming lessons in 2006 and launched Pink Spaghetti three years later.

In 2012 they decided to franchise their business, which offers a personal assistant service for small firms.

Now the pair are now celebrating the sale of their fifth franchise, which covers the central Leeds area.

Vicky said: “We learned a lot in our first few years of business and as a result, have enjoyed at least 50 per cent growth each year, taken on staff and opened an office.

“Franchising seemed like the logical next step.

“We knew we had a fantastic, part time business opportunity for mums.

“After all, if it fits in around our family responsibilities, we knew it could for others too.

“It has been a pleasure to pass on our knowledge to our franchisees and it definitely goes both ways.

“We are also learning from them.”

Their achievements have been recognised by the Kyros Franchising Awards, where they named finalists in the New Woman Franchisor of the Year 2013 category.

Vicky and Caroline are planning to sell two more franchises in 2014 and a further two in 2015.

Pink Spaghetti, named after Vicky and Caroline’s two daughters’, now both nine, mutual love of eating spaghetti and the colour pink.

It is a part-time, but scalable, home-based personal assistant business and its key clients are micro-businesses, very often run by women.

“The nature of women’s busy lives means that we usually end up helping our clients out with domestic tasks as well as business ones,” said Vicky.

“It’s not unusual for a to do list to include researching new suppliers, a spot of competitor analysis and then finding an entertainer for a children’s party.”