Steve Bolton (entrepreneur)
Steve Bolton (born 18 December 1967) is a British entrepreneur and the founder of the Bolt group of companies, which includes leading Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) marketing agency Bolt Digital and the e-commerce brand house Bolt Brands. Early life. Bolton was born in Bournemouth, Dorset, and lived in Durban, South Africa, between the ages of two and five. Bolton’s father Ronnie Bolton originates from Lancashire and is a former AFC Bournemouth midfielder, who played more than 250 games for the Dorset club between 1958 and 1969, alongside spells with Ipswich Town and Durban City. Bolton ’s entrepreneurial instincts developed from an early age, when he was encouraged by his father to start following stocks and shares aged just eight, while he also unsuccessfully wrote basic computer programmes to predict the outcome of horse races in his early teens. His mother, a French-born hairdresser, and father purchased a run-down block of flats in Bournemouth when Bolton was 11 – his first exposure to property investment – and he helped his parents convert the flats into holiday lets and worked in the family business during the school holidays. Despite his entrepreneurial flair, intelligence and willingness to work  hard, Bolton was disillusioned with the lack of relevance of schooling and left at 16 with no qualifications. Early career. After working as a kitchen porter and supermarket shelf stacker out of school, Bolton accepted an apprenticeship with outdoor pursuits company Joseph Allnatt on the south coast of England when he was 17 and quickly worked his way up to Head of Activities by the age of 19.  He also established the not-for-profit ‘Seahorse Club’ for the local community, which provided sporting and personal development activities every Saturday morning for up to 100 eight-to-12-year-old children .Bolton was headhunted in 1992 and helped to set up Brenscombe Outdoor Pursuits centre, near Corfe Castle in Dorset. After three years at Brenscombe, Bolton’s entrepreneurial instinct took over and he joined a new company, Ropes Course Developments (RCD), as a director and shareholder aged 27. RCD pioneered safety standards for the construction and training of ropes courses in the UK.  With his business partners, Nick and Melanie Moriarty, Bolton set up the first National Association, which received backing from government and industry and led to an explosion of growth in the sector, with RCD becoming the recognised European  market leaders by 1997. RCD went on to build adventure ropes courses for Center Parcs, First Choice Holidays, Outward Bound, the Royal Air Force and many others across Europe and in South Africa. Alongside RCD, Bolton founded Vision Development Training in 1997, based at the Wokefield Park site in Reading. Vision provided outdoor team, management and organisational development programmes for clients like British Airways, MicrosoftKodak, Xerox and KPMG, as well as the British and Irish Lions rugby team.However, in 2001 the outbreak of the Foot & Mouth pandemic in the UK and the economic impact of the 9/11 terror attacks  combined to push RCD into liquidation – something Bolton later described as the “best worst experience of my life”. Bolton was forced to sell his family home in Dorset to avoid bankruptcy in 2002. In 2002, Bolton set up a drop shipping business and became the exclusive European licensee for Mobile Team Challenge (MTC). MTC went on to become a very successful lifestyle business for several years before Bolton sold the company to his Managing Director. Property investment. With MTC flourishing and profitable, and inspired by his parents’ success in property investment, Bolton spent two years researching, learning, and developing his  own model of specialist property investment. Inspired by American sitcom ‘"Friends"’, which saw six individuals renting high-quality rooms in a New York apartment complex, Bolton began purchasing houses in Bournemouth and turning them into professional let Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs). Bolton went on to buy more than £6 million worth of residential property between 2004 and 2007, providing affordable shared living homes for more than 80 tenants. In 2007, Bolton’s accountant suggested he franchise his property business. He was already mentoring others to replicate his success and build highly-profitable portfolios that provided low-cost but  high quality accommodation and exemplary standards of service to tenants.   Platinum Property Partners. Bolton founded his first franchised business, Platinum Property Partners, in 2007, with Franchise Partners following Bolton’s business model and building portfolios of highly-profitable HMOs for key workers and working professionals. Platinum quickly became the fastest-growing premium franchise in UK history and by 2021, had helped more than 400 Franchise Partners establish and grow their own property businesses. More than 7,000 tenants now live in Platinum Franchise Partners’ properties, with more than £400m of property purchased by Partners since 2007. In 2016, Bolton  led an industry-wide campaign with fellow landlord Chris Cooper, aimed at overturning the Conservative government’s decision to restrict landlords’ ability to deduct mortgage finance costs as a business expense. The ‘Axe the Tenant Tax’ campaign represented more than 100,000 landlords and one million tenants in the UK. Bolton was the primary claimant in a Judicial Review against the government in relation to Section 24 of the Finance (No 2) Act 2015 – with a legal team fronted by Cherie Booth QC, (wife of former Prime Minister, Tony Blair.) The ‘Axe the Tenant Tax’ campaign achieved wide-spread national media  exposure and thrust Bolton into the spotlight as the face of the campaign. It broke two UK crowdfunding records in 2016 – raising more than £200,000 in the fastest recorded time. It also brought together all of the major landlord associations, two of which later merged as a consequence of their collaboration on the ‘Axe the Tenant Tax’ campaign. The campaign’s Judicial Review was thwarted at the High Court in October 2016 and the decision was made not to appeal. Bolton managed a gradual transition between 2017 and in 2020, exiting Platinum and his other property interests, which included  hotels and serviced office accommodation.  He retains a long-term commercial interest in residential and commercial property and gifted 20% of his shares to the staff of the Platinum franchise business. Bolt Digital. In 2017, Bolton formed a new business with media and marketing entrepreneur and former journalist Natasha Courtenay-Smith, to launch direct-to-consumer (D2C) performance marketing agency Bolt Digital. The agency works predominantly with brands in the e-commerce sector, helping them to scale D2C strategy and sales. From helping take brands like Absolute Collagen from £1,000 to £1 million in monthly sales, Bolt Digital  now works with multinational brands as well as responsible and sustainable SMEs. Bolt Brands and Buddy & Lola. Bolton and Courtenay-Smith, along with colleagues David Bell and Luke Courtenay-Smith, launched Bolt Brands in 2020. Bolt Brands acquires and scales direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands. The first acquisition was made in January 2020 with a dog supplement brand called Buddy & Lola. Axe the Tenant Tax. In 2016 Bolton co-founded and continues to lead a grassroots not-for-profit campaign called Axe the Tenant Tax. In a UK first, Bolton united the private rented sector by forming a Coalition of  all of the major organisations who are opposed to new government legislation that restricts landlords’ ability to deduct mortgage finance costs as a business expense. Coalition stakeholders represent more than 100,000 landlords who provide housing to more than 1 million tenants in the UK. Bolton and fellow landlord Chris Cooper were co-claimants in a Judicial Review against the UK government in relation to the legality of Section 24 of the Finance (No. 2) Act 2015. Their legal team was led by Cherie Blair CBE QC and their legal challenge campaign broke two legal crowdfunding records in 2016 by raising  over £200,000 within the fastest recorded timeframe. The campaign has been covered in hundreds of media articles, and Bolton has met the housing Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and MPs. Bolton believes the tax is a disaster for the UK housing market and is championing the cause for the small landlords and tenants who will suffer badly if this tax comes into force. Their Judicial Review was thwarted at the High Court on 6 October 2016. Bolton and Cooper have since focussed their campaign efforts on lobbying the UK government and working with MPs and Tenant Tax coalition  members to get the government to do a U-turn. Mentoring. For six years Bolton was a mentor for the Key Person of Influence programme, mentoring several thousand entrepreneurs and business owners during that time in a group setting. Philanthropy. Bolton has been an active philanthropist since 2007. Most of his work is now centered on the companies in the Bolt group, providing pro-bono mentoring and training to aspiring social-impact entrepreneurs. Bolton remains a life patron of not-for-profit organisation Peace One Day and has worked with them for more than a decade. Ratified by the United  Nations, Peace One Day has led to more than 13 million people living more peacefully through its quest to achieve a global ceasefire and day of non-violence every September 21. Bolton has also provided funding to the King’s Kid Orphanage in Mitiana, Uganda, with his donations leading to new housing, classrooms, water provision and the acquisition of farming land. Published work and speaking. Bolton is the author of the Amazon best-selling book ‘Profitable Property Secrets’, which has been updated three times since being first published in 2008. His keynote talk ‘Standing on the Shoulders of Giants’ has  seen Bolton appear on stage with a host of highly influential speakers, such as Simon Woodroffe (Yo!), James Caan (Dragon’s Den), and Kriss Akabussi (world champion athlete). Media appearances. Bolton and his businesses have been featured on a number of TV programmes and in media outlets including BBC, Channel Four, Sky News, Financial Times, Sunday Times, The Telegraph, Guardian, Express, the Mail and many trade publications in the franchise, entrepreneur, property and business sectors. He is often quoted in national media in relation to franchising, property, entrepreneurship and mentoring. Personal life. Bolton spends his time between his three homes  in Poole in Dorset, White City in London, and Ibiza. He has four children and a dog called Yogi, with his interests away from business including travel, boating, football, and fishing. He has taken three months’ holiday every year since 2004 (aside from Covid when international travel was not possible.)