MY LIGHT BULB MOMENT

Travel entrepreneur Lulu Townsend

LULU TOWNSEND, 47, lives with her husband Hamish and their two daughters. She set up her leading boutique hotel website Chic Retreats in 2002. MY CHILDHOOD was a happy one until age 11, when I was struck down by viral meningitis and spent ten days in hospital. For the first time I became aware of my mortality.

I recovered, but at 13, as I was about to play a tennis match, I began to feel poorly again. I went to the school nurse and the next thing I remember I was in an ambulance.

I had bacterial meningitis and was put in intensive care. I was delirious, believing I was on holiday — I think because the nurses had put pictures on a board at the end of my bed — I was also very hot.

It’s only now I look back that I realise how serious it was. As a result of the meningitis, I developed a kidney problem, glomerulo-nephritis, where the kidneys become inflamed, often due to the immune system attacking healthy tissue.

At the time, having beaten meningitis twice, I felt I had cheated Paradise: Vila Monte Farm House hotel in Portugal, chicretreats.com death. I had to take four types of medication every day for 12 years.

I went on to work in the events department of an investment bank and one of the benefits was private healthcare. I felt reassured by that, in case I got ill again. I also loved the routine, long hours and competitive nature of the job.

But at 24, when I finished taking all those medicines, I felt liberated. I was given the all-clear and finally felt I could take control of my life. I made a bucket list of places I wanted to visit and realised I wanted to work in travel.

I started to look at the marketing for my parents’ hotel, Palazzo Terranova, in Umbria, and thought how crazy it was that so many small hotels out there weren’t better known. None of them had much to spend on marketing and, back then (2002), the internet was in its infancy.

That was my lightbulb moment. I created a web page, made a presentation and sent it to 120 hotels under the banner Chic Retreats. Fifteen replied saying they would love to join the site.

Back then, I did everything for the business, even the accounting. The company has changed and developed since — we now have 700 hotels on our books — but I still sign off on every hotel and am proud to have a team who are as passionate as I am.