June Sarpong

What was your route into presenting?

It was through work experience, initially. I did work experience at Kiss FM, which led to a job at record company BMG, then Trevor Nelson, who was working at MTV, was looking for presenters, and I auditioned – and that was that, really! This is all I’ve ever wanted to do; I love talking, so getting paid to talk to people is a dream come true!

But it’s a hard industry to get into; people asking me how they should do it, and I think, God – I don’t know how people go about it now. It’s really hard; very competitive. I think that now, with the internet, people should do their thing online, like on MySpace.com or something. You might get picked up from there.

How easy or difficult did you find it?

Well, work experience sometimes does seem like a thankless task, but a lot of people do go through it. I had to make the tea, I had to do the photocopying, I had to do lots of other jobs because I wasn’t being paid – but the good thing about it is that it prepares you for when the real stuff happens, and for the knock-backs, because you don’t get every job you go up for. So you have to develop a thick skin.

If you decided to give all that up tomorrow and start your own dream business, what would it be, and why?

I think it would be something to do with branding and merchandising; I’d set up a company which created funky brands and cool merchandising for people.

One of my total idols is Robert Thorne – he’s behind all the Olsen twins [Mary-Kate and Ashley] branding, he’s a total genius. That’s what I’d want to do.

The great thing with my job is that I’m constantly meeting, and connecting with, real people, so I understand what they’re into, and what their likes and dislikes are, as opposed to getting a piece of paper telling you.

So, you wouldn’t do anything involving shoes?!

Well, yeah, that too! You could have shoes as part of a brand.

Make Your Mark aims to encourage young people to make their ideas happen. How important do you think it is for them to grow up in a culture that makes it easier for them to do this?

I think it’s imperative. Our population is only 60 million, and so many of our young people are not being properly utilised. I’m not only behind equality, I’m behind equal opportunities, because I think what people need is a level playing field, more than anything.

When you look at China, India, those Asian countries, they have immense populations. We can’t afford not to utilise all of our 60 million in our economy, because if they’ve got 1.4 billion people, and they only utilise only 10 per cent of that population, that’s still way more than we do. So in order to compete on a global stage, ten, twenty years from now, we’re going to have to encourage all our young people to become entrepreneurs, and scientists, and technicians, and move into that whole global technology age, otherwise we’ll be left behind. It’s quite scary.

You’ve met Gordon Brown before – what do you think of what he’s trying do in terms of encouraging enterprise in the UK?

He’s very good, and very vocal about it. Both he and Tony Blair are visionaries – they’re looking at the bigger picture and the long term. I do think that if Britain is to continue to be great, we really do have to utilise much more of our young people.

There are far too many young people who are getting into crime because they have nothing else to do. I think things have to be addressed from the primary school level.

We need to have things like games which encourage kids to be entrepreneurs. We need to encourage them to run the school tuck shop, for example; it’s things like that which will make things change. And card games!

I think if we don’t do something like that, we’re in big trouble.

How many people have you met who are in the process of making, or already have made their ideas happen?

Loads. What I love about it is that usually, we’re so used to men in grey suits running enterprise, and actually, with the internet, so many of these kids can go directly to their customers, so you don’t need the same level of investment to start up in the first place.

With the internet, you can just set up a website with a few prototypes, and when you get a few orders in, then you can start producing loads more. James Murray Wells, who set up the website selling glasses (glassesdirect.co.uk) had such a genius idea! We need to encourage young people to use the internet for things like that, and not just for networking, or chatrooms. It can be used for business, too. You don’t need a shop. Look at eBay – it has far more customers than any shop on the planet.

What would you say are the most important characteristics a young, budding entrepreneur needs?

Confidence, first and foremost; you need to be confident when you’re going into a negotiation, you need to be confident when you’re going to sell a product. That’s the key.

Do you know anyone who has started their own business?

Yes, loads of people. Designer Wale Adeyemi – he started his clothes shop on a market stall in Camden and grew it into the business it is today. In the fashion industry, it’s not easy, so he’s done incredibly well. Tamara Mellon, who grew the Jimmy Choo brand, has also been really successful.

However, being your own boss is not for everyone – it depends on the individual. Sometimes you can earn more working for someone else. Some people have to be their own boss because they can’t handle authority – it’s just down to what suits you best.

If you had one wish for a particular shop or service that would make life easier / more fun for you, what would it be?

Oooh, it’d have to be a personal chef, who cooked for the whole street. He’d go from house to house cooking for everyone, and all your neighbours would club together to pay for it. That’d be ideal! I just don’t have the time to cook myself, unfortunately.