How Christina Handasyde Dick Built a Multi-Million-Pound Care Franchise While Sailing the World

Built to Roam
Running a thriving business while sailing the world
By Entrepreneur UK Staff 

Christina Handasyde Dick has had an unusual route to entrepreneurship. From competing at two Olympic Games to scrubbing toilets and eventually building a multi-million-pound franchise business, her career has taken some unexpected turns. Along the way, she has built Guardian Angel Carers into a business that can run without her being tied to an office – allowing her to pursue another ambition too. Today, Christina runs the growing UK franchise network while sailing around the world with her husband and children.

Young sailor
Despite her first trip in a boat with her father at the age of seven ending in near disaster, ‘we tipped the boat and nearly sank’, Christina was a talented sailor from a young age, qualifying to represent GBR  three times at the International 420 World Championships, but her father refused to let her compete, saying: “Not until you’re good enough to win it”; which she did, on her first attempt at the age of 18.  Sailing success continued with two Olympic Games appearances, Athens in 2004 and Beijing in 2008. Then things took a turn, putting Christina through ‘a very dark time.’ Within weeks of returning from Beijing, her father died, her sailing partnership ended and she split up with her boyfriend. As she rallied to bounce back, a friend, who knew she was ‘a super-organised, clean freak’, suggested she play to her strengths and offer people a lifestyle management or home organisation service; as often happens, while contemplating the idea, a family friend reached out for domestic help, their own father’s cleaner couldn’t get to him, so Christina stepped in. Promotional postcards offering odd jobs were made and handed around the village and the jobs rolled in.

Hard comparisons
Despite now having a fledgling business, it was hard for Christina not to reflect on how far she’d fallen (her words not ours).  As her former team mates prepared for the next Olympics, she was cleaning toilets. It was a tough pill to swallow. Little did she know those toilets were about to change her life. Those menial cleaning jobs became her first business, Task Angels. Initially she did all the work herself, then employed sub-contractors until finally taking on her first member of staff, all within 12 months.  Christina describes the challenges of those early days: “we were the classic jack of all trades; everything relied on me, pricing, sourcing the right people, checking the work; it was exhausting, unsustainable and ultimately unprofitable.” Having grown up with two grandmothers in the house, Christina quickly recognised that some of her older clients also needed help with cooking, companionship and personal care. She realised she could create a business offering all those services, that would allow them to stay in their homes for longer, and, with guidance from her new boyfriend (now husband) who was a doctor, the pieces fell into place and Guardian Angel Carers was born. 

Funding
Having borrowed £10,000 from her cousin to get Task Angels off the ground, a figure she repaid within the first year, Christina was receptive when she received an offer to invest in her company for a 20% share of the business; she was flattered and her confidence was given a much-needed boost. On reflection she says the percentage was ‘a lot for the value contribution’ and she ended up having to remortgage her house to buy them out, but they then doubled their initial investment, leaving her with a “clear growth plan with 100% equity gain.” With an eye firmly fixed on the future, Christina set about building Guardian Angel Carers so it could be run by a head office team in the UK , with her working from anywhere in the world. Having already done some research about using the franchise method to grow a business, in the winter of 2020 with three company-owned branches and a pilot franchisee, Christina officially launched the franchise opportunity. 

Travel dreams
She explains why she built the business to run without her physical presence: “My husband Andrew and I had decided we wanted to sail to New Zealand after visiting in early 2020. Everything I did was focused on building the business so it could operate as if I was on a boat. We got there, just. Sometimes I wasn’t sure we’d actually make it, there were some bumps along the way, including the MD I had brought in to run the company, starting a competing company on our doorstep, but what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. I’d looked at franchising for Task Angels, so was aware of the concept and researched other care franchisors and utilised information from the BFA (British Franchise Association) for further guidance.” Fourteen years after its launch, Guardian Angel Carers now has 11 franchisees operating out of 17 territories, with a monthly network turnover of £1.58m, and in 2022 Christina was awarded the MBE from the Queen for ‘Services to Homecare during COVID’. And the plan to travel worked: Christina, husband Andrew and children Izzy (11), Jasmine (9) and Oscar (7) have been living aboard their floating home Freya for nearly two years and are currently based in Santa Marta, Colombia, for four months, while the kids attend a local school and learn Spanish. 

Communications
With Starlink, Christina says: “I have better connectivity sailing across an ocean than I do walking through Chichester”; and although she is five to six hours behind UK time and meetings are taken with children waking up around her and a mug of coffee in hand, she’s forging ahead with ambitious growth plans, including recruiting more franchisees who want to build care businesses in their local communities and to become the most human, tech-enabled care company in the UK. The company is also launching nursing services through their home branches; a new service for the brand.

Goals achieved
As she gets ready for another day of online meetings, Christina says: “The Olympics taught me discipline, resilience and focus, but business taught me something equally important: Confidence doesn’t come first. You take the next step, then the next and eventually you look back and realise how far you’ve come. I’m not the biggest homecare franchisor in the country and that’s ok. Success for me is leading an incredible team remotely, whilst sailing around the world with my husband and children, knowing we’ve built a business that changes lives daily, for our clients, our colleagues and our franchisees.”