Hi – it’s Rebecca.

For a long time, I believed something that sounded completely logical: if I wanted to make £10,000 a month, surely it would be easier to build five stores making £2,000 each than one store making £10,000.

At the time, it felt like a smart strategy. Spread the risk. Multiple opportunities. Multiple chances to win.

The problem was that I wasn’t multiplying revenue. I was multiplying complexity.

The Illusion

One store doing £10,000 a month feels difficult. Five stores doing £2,000 a month feels achievable.

That’s what makes the idea so attractive. The numbers look smaller. The target feels closer. The risk appears lower. On paper, it makes perfect sense.

In reality, something very different happens.

Because you don’t end up with five revenue streams. You end up with five businesses:

Five websites
Five suppliers
Five customer service inboxes
Five analytics dashboards
Five sets of products
Five marketing plans
Five technical problems
Five monthly accounts
And most importantly… five sets of leaks

For me, the second store didn’t halve the journey to £10,000 a month – it doubled the complexity of getting there. The third would have tripled it. The fifth would have buried me.

Looking back, one of the earliest signs I was heading in the wrong direction wasn’t revenue.

It was filing trays.

Every new store seemed to require another system. Another spreadsheet. Another supplier file. Another set of invoices. Another pile of paperwork. A bucket.

At one point, I had so many Müller filing trays stacked around the living room that there was barely any space left. That’s when it finally hit me.

I wasn’t building leverage. I was building administration.

I thought I was creating multiple paths to success. In reality, I was creating multiple businesses competing for the same time, attention, and energy.

The Hidden Cost of More

You may think about the upside of adding another store. Few think about the maintenance cost.

A second store isn’t just another opportunity – it’s another responsibility. A third store isn’t diversification – it’s another set of problems. A fourth store isn’t freedom – it’s another system demanding attention. A fifth store isn’t leverage – it’s five businesses competing for the same founder.

That’s the part I completely underestimated.

Every decision multiplied. Every distraction multiplied. Every problem multiplied. Every leak multiplied.

I Thought I Was Spreading Risk

Looking back, I realised something important.

I thought I was spreading risk. I was spreading focus.

And that’s a very different thing.

Because focus compounds.

Customer understanding compounds.
Offer improvements compound.
Marketing insights compound.
Systems compound.

When you’re working on one business, every lesson strengthens the whole system. When you’re working on five, those lessons fragment. Your attention divides. Your energy divides. Your progress divides.

The result is often five average businesses instead of one great one.

The Depth Advantage

What finally changed my thinking was realising that depth usually beats breadth.

One store. One customer. One offer. One system.

Improve it. Strengthen it. Optimise it. Scale it.

Then – and only then – think about adding complexity.

The founders who build meaningful businesses rarely jump from one opportunity to another. They go deeper. While everyone else is chasing the next thing, they’re improving the thing they already have.

That’s where compounding begins.

The Multiple Store Solution

The bucket is leaking. I know. Let’s buy four more buckets.

🤣

It sounds ridiculous – yet founders do the equivalent all the time.

Instead of fixing the leak in one business, they start another. Then another. Then another. The hope is that one of them will eventually work. Or all of them will work and you leave no money on the table :).

The reality is that every bucket needs filling. Every bucket needs maintaining. And every bucket can leak.

A Question Worth Considering

Are you genuinely outgrowing your current business? Or are you trying to escape its problems?

Because those are very different decisions.

The next opportunity often looks attractive because it doesn’t have any visible problems yet. The current business does – usually because you’re close enough to see them.

This Week’s Leak

Many founders believe more stores reduce risk. Often they simply reduce focus.

Because depth compounds. Complexity divides.

The fastest route to growth is often not another store – it’s improving the one you already have.

What do you think? Have you tried to run more than one ecommerce store at the same time?

Reply and let me know.

Until next Saturday,

Rebecca

Other Leaks You Might Have Missed…

#009 coming next Saturday.
#007. Why Scaling Too Early Makes Everything Worse
#002. The Validation Trap: The Assumption I Didn’t Know I Was Making

#008. Why More Stores Isn’t The Answer