Welsh apprentice winner Alana Spencer has described the agonising moment she cracked four ribs while setting up her new coffee shop venture. Alana, a baker and entrepreneur from Aberystwyth, won the twelfth series of BBC One's The Apprentice in 2016.
Her success bagged her a £250,000 investment from Lord Sugar for her luxury cake and chocolate business, Ridiculously Rich by Alana. Since appearing on the show, the 30-year-old has opened a number of seafront shops offering coffee and sweet treats around Wales, including in Aberystwyth, Llandudno and Caernarfon.
To help boost income during the quieter winter months at her seaside stores, Alana told WalesOnline she has set out on creating a high street branch at St Catherine's Walk, Carmarthen. Originally due to open on June 17, Alana and her team were just sorting out the finishing touches when she fell eight feet from a ladder at around 11am on Wednesday, June 8.
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Alana, who is now resting at home, said: "We're nearly ready in there, we've built the bar so it's just final touches now. I like to get stuck in and involved myself so I was just trying to decorate our upstairs seating area and I totally lost balance. I fell off a ladder and ended up cracking four of my ribs. I fell eight feet and landed on the metal ladder, which did the damage.
"We called an ambulance and I got taken to hospital. They tried to make me walk, but I just couldn't. They ended up having to put me on a stretcher and carrying me down the stairs. I had a CT scan and was quite lucky that there was no other damage as breaking ribs can be quite serious. I feel quite grateful really."
Speaking of her plan for the new shop, Alana said the menu will be similar to her other branches. She said there would just be some tweaks to the operation of the shop to suit a busy high street. She said: "[The other branches] are seasonal sites on the seafronts so they are really busy in the summer and then get quieter in the winter. So we wanted to open one that was more of a high street store with a similar menu.
"The plan was to open a high street store which is very similar to our others but more similar to the chain coffee shops in the way that they operate, so having grab and go products all wrapped to take to the counter."
At the hospital, Alana said it could take up to six weeks for her to fully heal from her fall. She said her accident had set the plans back, however that she would find other ways to get involved so the shop could still open this month - albeit a week later. You can get more What's On news and other story updates by subscribing to our newsletters here.
She said: "We are provisionally saying it's just going to push us back a week, so June 24 is what we are now aiming for. I can't be involved in the pre-opening stuff, but I will be there on the opening day. We've had to pivot our plans a bit but we want to get it open as soon as possible. Business is tough for everyone at the moment and we need to be open - every day we're not open is costing us money.
"There's a joke that I can't switch off and this has forced me to have switch off time. I've just been sitting watching movies in bed not really knowing what to do with myself. It is very bizarre, but I will still very much be involved, I'll just have to find other ways."
