Brand Growth Heroes (Fiona Fitz | Brand Growth Heroes Mini MBA | )

VITHIT: This episode is the first in a 2-part series where we dive deep into the journey of the leading vitamin water in the UK and Ireland, through the eyes of its Irish founder, Gary Lavin.

VITHIT is a brand close to my heart, because the branding was designed by my truly talented brother and best friend, Dave of Dave Fitz Design, a boutique brand design agency in Dublin.

VITHIT is a great example of a winning brand that has taken it's time to learn, grow and get to a category leadership position, but where it hasn't happened over night, and there have been plenty of challenges overcome along the way.

In this episode recorded a few years ago, you'll learn Gary's secrets to getting the brand to 30 million pounds in sales through his tenacity and hands-on approach, and in the next episode - which will be released straight after this one - we catch up with Gary in real time (November 2024) to find out how he's managed to hit a run-rate of £80m in global sales for 2025! 

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CPG Founders: Want to know the secret *three NEW must-haves* that investors are insisting on in the current economic climate?

Verlinvest is the investment company behind your favourite insurgent brands like Tony's Chocolonely, Oatly, Mutti, Vita Coco and Who Gives a Crap. 

Their investment - and their team - is helping to build some of the world's largest consumer brands. 

In this episode (recorded a few months back), I speak to Director Ben Black and I get some top advice for founders looking for funding.

But most importantly...we'll let you in on a secret: 

There are THREE NEW THINGS that investors are looking for in today's economic climate. These are not listed here, you’re going to have to listen to the show!

And as a bonus…you'll also learn:

1. At what point in time do you need to be showing profitability in your business plan?
2. What a consumer revolution is and why it matters
3. What Fiona means by 'understanding your consumers’ ‘inflation-friction’  and why it's KEY
4. What VCs actually DO to help founders other than offer money
5. How you know that you're not trying HARD enough....

I hope you enjoy this latest episode and learn as much as I did recording it!

Want to work with Fiona?
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can help develop your commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Hunter and Gather is a cross-category food AND supplement brand that's already achieving a gross sales value of nearly £6 million pounds.
In this episode, clever and passionate founders Amy Moring and Jeff Webster offer us a world-class case study on consumer targeting: if you can pinpoint a group of people who have a specific, higher-order need rooted in health, and you offer them a solution that satisfies this need in a far superior way to alternatives, the rules that the food industry has slavishly followed for 40-50 years can be broken.
We talk half-truths from big food, charging £14 for a jar of mayonnaise, lost ancestral wisdom, and why Hunter & Gather is NOT a vegan brand.

Scott McCulloch and his wife Karris started their vegan subscription box from the living room of their flat in 2013. Nine years later, The Vegan Kind Supermarket is a multi-million pound UK online vegan grocer, the first and largest of its kind.

 Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin.

In this episode - our first with a grocery retailer - you'll learn:

- Why and how Scott and Karris started their vegan subscription box business - including the steps they took to find their first 50 subscribers
- How the business evolved to become the UK's biggest online exclusively-vegan supermarket
- The exact steps YOU need to take to get YOUR retail buyer's attention...
- Scott's view on what the vegan market/landscape will look like in 5 years' time (and it's radical...)
- How you're going to have to get ready to compete with significant private-label/retailer own-brand vegan ranges over the coming year or so...
- and why the time is right for him and his wife Karris to step back from running the day-to-day of their multi-million pound online supermarket.

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin.
Follow The Vegan Kind Supermarket here.
Come to Fiona's workshop at Bread and Jam Festival in London 18/19 July 2022 here
Learn more about the opportunity to work with Fiona's here: The Growth Strategy Programme and Fiona Fitz Consulting

Don't miss further episodes!
Click the subscribe or 'bell' button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app to make sure you get the latest from Brand Growth Heroes podcast.

Have you ever messed up and felt like you were the only founder in the world to make such a stupid mistake?
 
Simona Deifta, female powerhouse and founder of the brilliant sauces and dressings Nojo London, shares one of the biggest brand growth bloopers she's made along the way to getting national listings with Ocado, Co-Op, Wholefoods and Amazon.

YOU can be featured on Brand Growth Bloopers! Just send me a WhatsApp on +447418605547 and tell me the following:

• Your name
• Your brand website and Instagram handle
• A quick outline of your brand growth blooper, for example, 'manufacturing disaster, wrong ingredients' or 'no laptop power at a Tesco buyer meeting' etc
• What's in it for you? If you are chosen to feature on the show, you'll have the opportunity to share your brand growth blooper story as well as sharing your website, instagram and LinkedIn handles to thousands of listeners around the world. You could even do what Simona did, and share a coupon code!

So that you don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses,
click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app (on apple podcasts it's three dots like this (...)

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can group-coach your senior commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

$500M: OLIPOP explodes the USA Soda Market

Join us for Fiona Fitz’s recent conversation with OLIPOP Co-Founder & President David Lester, recorded live at the Bread and Jam Festival.

OLIPOP Co-Founders David Lester and Ben Goodwin landed on the foundational recipe for “a new kind of soda”, redefining how consumers perceived the category. OLIPOP has successfully persuaded consumers to swap out sugary, familiar favourites for healthier alternatives.

In colourful cans with vintage logos and fantastic flavours, OLIPOP aims to smash its target of $500 million in sales in 2024.

Listen to this episode and find out how they've done it.

David reveals:

The eight-year journey behind OLIPOP's rapid growth, explaining that despite its apparent surge since the 2018 launch, the company actually underwent a crucial four-year trial process beforehand.

The importance of balancing taste with health benefits and the rollercoaster of emotions that comes with being a founder.

We all expected this interview to be about how he and Ben grew the business. In fact, David offers candid insights on ego, vulnerability, and the true meaning of success.

If you are still alive then you are succeeding.

Useful links:

https://drinkolipop.com/

Bread and Jam Festival

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us across our socials: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme here.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and our social media manager/podcast producer, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

Fiona talks to Alex Smith, the founder of innovative Strategy Consultancy Basic Arts.

A TedEx veteran, Alex has got some really interesting and different ideas around how a brand can create uncontested market space, how we should all avoid the current trend of 'Blanding', and how Brand Purpose has been hijacked.

I came across Alex's Ted talk when I was deepening my understanding of Blue Ocean strategy or how to compete in uncontested market spaces, and you can find it here.

Alex has a a great weekly newsletter and an email-based short-course that will stretch your strategic brain, which you can sign up for here

Hello everyone! In celebration of hitting 10.5K downloads, welcome to the first UPDATE episode of Brand Growth Heroes podcast, where I'm going to spend just 5 minutes or so telling you what you can expect over the coming months. I'm really excited to share some big launch news right at the end, so don't go anywhere just yet!

First of all, I can't believe that it's nearly 18 months since the first BGH episode. What started out as a way of updating my suitcase of brand growth case studies,  BGH has now become way bigger than I ever intended it to, with over 50 5star ratings in different iTunes stores across the world. This might be still small in the world of podcasts, but it's helping me to realise MY brand purpose, which is to create lightbulb moments for leaders of scaling brands, in order to smooth their path to profitable, transformational growth.

So, thanks so much to all of you who have listened, subscribed, reviewed it on iTunes and written to me to say just how much you're learning from the interviews. I'm learning a huge amount from too, and for that I'm truly grateful to all of our super guests. Big shout out particularly to James McMaster of Huel for taking the risk of being my first interviewee, that could have gone either way, so thank you James.
Another shout out to Ivan Juric at Octopod productions (https://octopod.productions/), the best sound editor in the world, Gyp Buggane here at Ballagroove recording studios (https://studio.ballagroove.com/)- the best recording studio in the world you guys have both been a huge help both technically and with moral support.

We've just begun recording series 3, in which alongside more insurgent food and beverage brands,  we're going to dip in and out of learning about scaling personal care brands such as soap, feminine care and the future of toothpaste. This month and next we are recording episodes with Lucky Saint beer and as well as another Masterclass with Mark Mulhern from Brand Performance Labs in New York, this time on what Performance Marketing is and why you need to understand it.

I've been spending lots of time preparing for a big talk I'm giving to the grocery industry in Austria tomorrow, as well as working on some exciting new developments that I'll share with you at the end of this update.
The week before last was a massive week where I was helping out at our favourite Food and Beverage start up festival, Bread and Jam 2.0.
I loved meeting many of our UK and Europe-based listeners, and got the chance to chat to you when we worked together at my workshop on ‘Crafting a Compelling Value Proposition’. At this, we went through how you can make sure you’re offering something of real value to your target consumer or customer, based on solid consumer insight. We looked at WHAT a value proposition is, what YOUR value proposition is, WHY you need to define it, why it needs to be based on CONSUMER INSIGHT and HOW to go about it working through.
Thanks to so many of you who wrote to me on LinkedIn after the workshop, it was great to get to meet you and I'm glad it was useful for you.

OK so finally I wanted to share some big news: Over the past 10 years, my own business has evolved from delivering traditional consultancy projects for consumer goods clients, to helping them upskill their teams to do this work themselves. This, I'm reliably informed, is called Capability Development, and that's squarely where I serve.. I do this through individual and group coaching of senior teams, but also by developing and delivering workshops and programmes to help clients develop their strategic thinking and people. Why am I telling you this? Because in January I'm launching a new online course arm to the business, under the sub-brand Brand Growth Blueprint.
We'll be delivering self-directed quick, deep-dive courses on topics such as Crafting a Compelling Value Proposition, How to Sharpen your Consumer Targeting, and How to Evaluate the Size of the Opportunity you're targeting.
But we're also launching a live, accompanied 6 week programme for founders/CEOs of successful scaling brands called The Growth Strategy Programme which will give you a bespoke framework,  tools and support to make clear decisions about where you want to play and create the roadmap to growth that you, your team and your potential investors need. Starting mid-January, working with 10-15 founders of non competing brands, we look at how you can articulate your brand or business purpose define your vision and objectives for this business, one that works for ourselves,  our family , our team, for the community and for the environment sharpen your definition of your consumer and customer targets, and decide which of their needs to target with our offer ensure our value proposition is clear and compelling - that it can win We also look at which geographies, customers and channels we going to focus our sales and marketing efforts? and what kind of activities should we invest in, as well as the team you’re going to need to accompany you. If you're the founder or CEO of a successful scaling brand, and you recognise that the time has come to start formalising your strategy, then register your interest on www.fionafitzconsulting.com/onlinecourses.
If you’re already sure you want to join the first cohort of this programme starting the week of Jan 11th, then drop me a note on Linkedin and I can sign you up directly!

That's it from me, watch out for our new episodes coming late November!

Strong Roots has strong plans to hit £100 million in sales over the next few years.
In this third episode together, the founder Sam Dennigan and I discuss HOW they're going to do this.

So if you want to hear what big-ticket innovation really means, how Sam and his team are approaching international expansion in both the USA and Europe, how their foray into Dark Kitchens in New York City is going AND why they've brought their creative agency in-house - and how that works - then don't miss this!

 
https://www.strongroots.com/usa/
https://www.instagram.com/strongrootsusa/
https://www.facebook.com/strongrootsirl

Hear how Marisa and Teddy learned from their big-green-explosion-mistake, whilst preparing for their first-ever show - the London Coffee Festival!

If you'd like the chance to be featured on Brand Growth Bloopers, please send us a WhatsApp on +447418605547 and tell us the following:

• Your name & email address
• Your brand website and instagram handle
• A quick outline of your brand growth blooper, for example 'manufacturing disaster, wrong ingredients' etc
• If you are chosen to feature on the show you'll have the opportunity to share your brand with our audience including what you make, who you’re for, and your website, instagram and LinkedIn handles.
• Every brand that is featured on the Brand Growth Blooper bonus episodes will go into a draw with the chance to win a place on the next Brand Growth Accelerator programme (formally The Growth Strategy Programme) in October 2023.

Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app (on apple podcasts it's three dots like this (...)

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme

See how Fiona’s group coaching programmes can help develop your senior commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

ODDBOX is a D2C (Direct-to-Consumer) BCorp business with a bold vision: a world where all food grown is eaten.
 
Husband & wife team Deepak Ravindran and Emilie Vanpoperinghe founded the business 8 years ago, and have allowed their passion for sustainability to design their clever business model.

ODDBOX delivers boxes of fruit, vegetables, and other products that are at risk of waste to their 500,000 D2C customers. Working closely with growers and suppliers, they originally focused on produce that may not meet cosmetic specifications or size requirements set by retailers but is still perfectly good to eat. 

In this episode, they share their journey from coming up with the idea for ODDBOX and testing it with 20 customers, to eventually growing the business to £32 million

You’ll learn :

• How they started their business packing ODDBOXes in a local church hall
• How they accessed the cash to fund their spectacular growth
• The importance of their relationships with growers, managing the supply chain and ensuring excellent customer experience
• Their plans for future growth, including their recently launched ODDSHOP and ODDBOX-branded consumer packaged products
• How they implemented geo-targeted marketing strategies, focusing on driving demand in the specific areas where they were delivering their boxes.
• Why traditional marketing methods like leaflet distribution through door-to-door worked well for them
• Their thoughts and experience of the effectiveness of influencer marketing but later found it to be successful in building awareness and trust.

Don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses!
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can group-coach your senior commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Founder Barney Mauleverer describes Fuel10k as 'a 12 year overnight success'

In Part 2 of our two part series covering the growth journey & sale of the protein breakfast brand Fuel10k to Premier Foods, learn:

• The three reasons that Fuel10k was the perfect fit for Premier Foods already impressive national brand portfolio
• It Fuel10K 10 years to get to £10 million in revenue but 2.5 years to do the next £10 million
• £10 million turnover is the magic number: the figure at which your P&L and growth trajectory to change for the better
• Why Fuel10K NEVER had an injection of big bucks & why they wanted to grow their business the old-fashioned way
• The role of Student Reps working in, in universities as part of their field sales and marketing team
• Why it's never too early to build relationships with the M&A advisory world
• One of Barney's key talents is putting the right people in the right roles
• Why Barney and his co-founders gave 1 years salary to those employees who had been in the business for over 2 years.

A favour! Could you #Payitforward?
I really hope that you enjoyed this episode & that it has helped you in some way!
If so, would you take 3 mins to click FOLLOW on your podcast app, as well as leave a review?
This small gift from you has a big impact on me ... and on MY business.
Thank you 🙏

Don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses!
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme

We are thrilled to welcome back Irish entrepreneur Gary Lavin, the founder of VITHIT Drinks. VITHIT is brand that’s seen incredible growth in recent years, establishing itself as a leader in the vitamin water in the UK and Ireland. With an £80 million run-rate in 2025, and multiple international markets, VITHIT is now a global player to be reckoned with.

But, like so many others, the real story here lies in founder Gary's relentless journey - one that that transformed a small idea into a business that knocked global brands such as Vitamin Water from off their perch in the UK, in the space of just a few years.

And Gary Lavin isn’t just a guest; he’s one of Fiona’s oldest friends in business. He joins us to share his story of resilience, taking on industry giants, navigating new markets, and building a brand with a laser focus on innovation and grit.

And if you’re interested in hearing more, we’ve just re-released our first interview with Gary from four years ago as a companion to this episode. So, if you’re listening now, consider this episode, part two of the VITHIT story! LINK PART ONE 

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, PLEASE click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE and leave a review. You don't want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Useful links:

Website

Gary's LinkedIn

VITHIT LinkedIn

Instagram

Facebook

By the way, if you're listening to this on Spotify, you'll find a place where it says ASK A QUESTION. You can ask Fiona a question, and she will be able to answer you. So, if you have any questions about this episode or anything you thought helpful, please let Fiona know!

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to keep learning from the founders of challenger brands who are thinking differently about growth.

Follow us across our socials: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Mini MBA here.

Thanks to my Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

Dr. Will Breakey is the Co-founder of Dr Will's natural condiments brand. 
In this episode you'll hear:

• How Dr Will's is taking on Big Food in the Ketchup & Mayo aisle
• What it's like being a real doctor and the founder of a food company
• About the brand's recent successes on social platforms like TikTok and LinkedIn
• Why did they choose to have a virtual team
• And their recent crowdfunding, that resulted in nearly 800 new investors.

We're thrilled to welcome back Fuel 10k founder Barney Mauleverer for his third appearance on Brand Growth Heroes. 

Barney's just wrapped up an incredible 13-year journey with Fuel 10K, and he's here to chat about the grit and patience it takes to build and sell a company. Trust us, if you're a founder facing your own hurdles, you'll want to tune in for this one!

Barney's story shows that success isn't always about sprinting to the finish line. Sometimes, it's more like running a marathon. Every experience, good or bad, plays a part in the big picture. His journey is super-inspiring for founders out there, reminding us that there is something to learn from every experience - even the not-so-glamorous stuff like factory floor checks!

But wait, there's more! Barney's also spilling the beans on his latest venture. He's just launched the 'FUTURE OF FOOD competition, a cool competition for entrepreneurs who are shaping what we'll be eating tomorrow (unusually, it's free to enter and attend).

The final round will be held on November 26th at the stunning venue: The Royal Geographic Society - 16 finalists pitch to win in front of food industry luminaries, with an audience of entrepreneurs, investors, buyers and journalists. I'm lucky enough to be a judge on the day, so come and say hello!

Thank you, Barney, for shining a light on the future of the industry/market/how we will feed ourselves. We hope you enjoy this episode and will join us on the 23rd November - register to attend here!

By the way, if you're listening to this on Spotify, you'll find a place where it says ASK A QUESTION.

You can ask Fiona a question, and she will be able to answer you. So, if you have any questions about this episode or anything you thought helpful, please let Fiona know!

Useful links/info:

Future Food Competition info here

Register to attend here

Barney’s LinkedIn

The Future of Food Competition is a free, fully inclusive, not-for-profit event. Amidst significant global changes and rapidly evolving megatrends, this challenge shines a spotlight on opportunities and issues in the food industry. By encouraging debate, entrepreneurialism and innovative thinking, we seek to drive progress and positive change. We hope this event becomes a regular highlight in the calendar for everyone passionate about investing in food entrepreneurship.

Here's the running order:

12am – Attendees arrive and network

12.45 – Doors shut

13.00 – Setting the scene...

• Mike Berners-Lee – author of There Is No Planet B and How Bad Are Bananas & passionate expert in Carbon Footprinting.
• Pen Hadow – Arctic record-breaker and conservationist dedicated to protecting the seas and its wildlife.
• Kevin Dorren is an AI enthusiast and shifting populations specialist.

14.30 - All attendees circulate the Pitch Tables

15.30 - Judges preside & with a Popular Vote, and select 3 of the best

• Miranda Ballard from NielsenIQ uses case study data to explain how entrepreneurial endeavour can impact big business.

16.00 – 3 top finalists invited to pitch in the iconic Ondaatje Theatre + Q&A

16.45 – Judges & Popular Vote (Strictly style!) Gold, Silver, Bronze are announced & prizes awarded

17.00 - It’s a wrap!

Future Food Competition info here

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us across our socials: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme here.

Thanks to my Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane,

Ballagroove.com

and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts,

Social KEWS

"What is Susan who's 40 talking about with her friends when she picks the kids up from school? Or what is Dave who's 50, who's a builder, sharing in his WhatsApp group? What kind of videos are you sharing that you're seeing online? Or what kind of TV shows are they watching and talking about with their friends?'

Subscribe now by hitting the followbutton beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app.

As a rule, I don't interview marketing agencies on Brand Growth Heroes, but I made an exception when I reached out to our next guest.
Dan Knowlton is one half of Knowlton, a digital and social media market agency that has me in stitches with the videos they create and post on LinkedIn. If you don't follow them yet, I suggest you do.

Both Dan and his brother Lloyd Knowlton are hilarious. But why is this of value to you? Well, since I interviewed Jake Carls of Midday Squares and then Teddy and Marissa of Perfect Ted a few episodes ago, I've been exploring how the concept of advertainment works and why it's way more important to you as a grocery brand leader than just posting product shots.

Dan knows way more about advertainement than I do, so I thought a good chat with him would be of real value to us all.

Here are the top 5 things you'll learn :

1. How to truly understand your Target Audience, in a way you never have before
2. How to Connect with What Really Matters to your Audience
3. How to Trigger their Emotions
4. How to Build Trust and Overcome Objections 
5. Where to Allocate your Budget in your marketing funnel

Please leave a review on your podcast app if you enjoyed this episode!

Don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses!
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community! Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can group-coach your senior commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Perfect Ted, the natural energy drinks brand powered by matcha green tea, has taken the UK food and drink industry by storm.

Despite launching just 18 months ago, Marisa, Teddie, and Levi have grown their business to a run-rate of £5M, secured a national listing with Tesco UK across three different in-store categories, and even won offers from all five dragons on Dragon's Den.

What's more, they've accomplished this by successfully taking a niche ingredient that they are passionate about into the mass market.

Make sure you get the latest from Brand GrowthHeroes -> Click the follow or ...  dropdown button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app now!  You can also follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok and Linkedin.

In this episode, Marissa and Teddie chat with Fiona about their journey to success. They discuss the biggest mistakes they've made, how they struggled with positioning their brand and the role of matcha, and how they ultimately hit on the winning solution through their work on The Growth Strategy Programme. They emphasize the importance of focusing on product benefits rather than just ingredients and reveal the advice they would give to any founders preparing for a pitch to investors, buyers or Dragons!

The duo also share their experience on Dragon's Den and how it was by far the biggest risk they've taken to date. They talk about the impact the show has had on their sales, and the personal investment necessary to grow their business. Additionally, they discuss the benefits of having a strong multi-channel customer base and reveal how they secured their first Michelin star listing.

Finally, Marisa and Teddie answer the question everyone wants to know: what it's like to have Dragon and serial entrepreneur Steven Bartlett as a mentor!!

Tune in to hear their inspiring story and valuable insights into building a successful brand.

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can help develop your commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Perfect Ted Instagram
Perfect Ted Tiktok
Perfect Ted website
Teddie Linkedin
Marisa Linkedin

In this episode, Fiona speaks to Aneisha Soobroyen, founder of the gorgeous pet food brand Scrumbles, food for cats and dogs that's good for their gut AND good for the planet. 
Hear how 'pretty poos' are driving category growth, how Scrumbles competes in the highly competitive pet food category against global players, what it's like to work with your husband... and why they decided to raise funds early on in their growth journey.

Scaling a CPG brand isn’t just about great products and standout branding—it’s also about navigating a legal maze that can come with fast business growth, in many different guises.
In this episode of Brand Growth Heroes, Fiona Fitz sits down with Phil Hails-Smith and Paul Chiappe, managing partners at corporate law firm Joelson, to cover the legal essentials every CPG founder needs to know.
With over 30 years of experience supporting some of the fastest-growing CPG brands - clients like Little Moons, Trip, Eat Natural, Bear Graze and Pulsin - Joelson is also famous for advising the innocent founders in their landmark sale to Coca-Cola.

From intellectual property and contracts to regulatory compliance and international expansion, we explain how the right legal partners can protect your brand while unlocking new opportunities.  We also chat about:

• The biggest legal pitfalls CPG founders face (and how to avoid them) 
• Why contracts, IP, and compliance are make-or-break for scaling 
• How a great legal team can help you negotiate better deals and partnerships Real-world examples of legal strategies that fuel business growth.

We're also thrilled to announce that Joelson is now the official sponsor of Brand Growth Heroes, continuing their commitment to empowering founders with the knowledge and legal support they need to scale successfully.

So tune in to learn why legal expertise isn’t just about risk mitigation—it’s can actually be a strategic weapon for scaling smarter and faster, if you're smart!

Useful Links:

Joelson website

Joelson LinkedIn

Paul Chiappe LinkedIn

Phil Hails-Smith LinkedIn

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, this small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and our YouTube channel!

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

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Thanks to Brand Growth Heroes’ podcast sponsor - Joelson, the commercial law firm

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If you're a founder, you already know how much of your energy goes into building the perfect product, creating standout branding and connecting with your consumers.

But don’t forget that scaling a CPG business also comes with a maze of legal complexities that can make or break your business journey. From contracts, term sheets and regulatory compliance to protecting your brand's intellectual property as you expand, it's essential to get it right.

And that starts with the right legal partner. With long term relationships with clients like Little Moons, Trip, Eat Natural, Bear Graze and Pulsin, Joelson is also famous for advising the innocent founders in their landmark sale to Coca-Cola! 

Not many law firms are also BCorps, nor do they specialise in helping founders navigate the legal challenges of scaling without stifling the creativity and momentum that got you here in the first place. 
Finally, as an almost all-female team here at BGH, we're especially impressed by Joelson's commitment to championing female founders in CPG. 

If you'd like to get in touch to find out more, why don't you drop them a line on hello@joelsonlaw.com!
Joelson - we’re delighted to have you on board.

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The Cheeky Panda is on a mission to transform the type of paper products we all use across Household, Beauty, and Baby products. By using surplus bamboo instead of trees as their raw material, The Cheeky Panda makes products that are kinder to your skin as well as to the planet. In this episode, founders Chris and Julie tell us how and why they set up the business, and how they’ve grown it to £17M in sales in only 6 years, with relatively little external funding.

Find out more about The Cheeky Panda - and try some!
Follow Brand Growth Heroes on Instagram
Discover more about Fiona Fitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fionafitz/
Discover more about the show: https://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/

Like what you hear & want to work with Fiona, and join a network of hundreds of scaling CPG brands?
Discover her programmes for the founders of consumer/grocery brands below:

• For the founders of SCALING grocery brands: The Growth Strategy Programme: The only online Business Accelerator for scaling consumer packaged goods brands. Read the testimonials here: https://www.fionafitzconsulting.com/courses/brand-growth-strategy-programme
• For EARLY-STAGE brands, try Brand Growth Bootcamp Masterclass Membership - Fiona's classes & group for founders of early-stage startup consumer brands https://fionafitzconsulting.mykajabi.com/offers/eRBTBioC/checkout

Thanks to Strong Roots for supporting series 5 of Brand Growth Heroes.

Renée Elliott is the original founder of much-loved UK organic retailer Planet Organic...and now she's back: to rescue the business out of administration. At the time of recording, we are 3 weeks into this rescue deal. All the latest insider info is right inside this episode, along with some invitations to suppliers to join Planet Organic on their new journey, as well as information on Renée's upcoming women's retreat (www.womentree.uk).

In this episode, we we talk about how Rich Goldsmith and his team have built an entire category and a strong omni-channel business, the importance of creating the ideal end-to end consumer experience and of course, and as always, the different phases of growth of the business and the all important question of funding and investment. 

This is one of my favourite interviews so far, so I hope you enjoy it and learn as much as I did doing it!

In this latest episode, we’re diving into the remarkable story of Scott Davies, the visionary Welsh founder of Hilltop Honey. From an early career as a bricklayer and coal yard worker to building a £50M business (number two in the market) and designing and building his own 55,000 square foot factory, Scott’s story is a testament to resilience, innovation, and an unyielding passion for bees and business!

Scott takes us behind the scenes of Hilltop Honey’s unlikely start and rise to success, sharing his experiences and the strategies that have helped him overcome challenges and achieve incredible growth. It's packed with inspiration for founders, dreamers, and anyone looking to turn adversity into opportunity. If you are interested in understanding what it takes to grow and lead a business of this size, then this is an episode for you.

By the way, if you're listening to this on Spotify, you'll find a place where it says ASK A QUESTION. You can ask Fiona Fitz a question, and she will be able to answer you. So, if you have any questions about this episode or anything you thought helpful, please let Fiona know!

Useful links:

Hilltop Honey Website

Scott Davies LinkedIn

Instagram

Facebook

AND ... if this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, PLEASE click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE and leave a review. You don't want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to keep learning from the founders of challenger brands who are thinking differently about growth:
Follow us across our BGH socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the

Brand Growth Heroes Mini MBA here.

Thanks to my Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

A small favour: If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, please please hit FOLLOW and even leave a review!This tiny gesture from you means the world to us, and allows us to share these nuggets of insight and value with you more often. We see every new follow and read every review so thank you in advance!
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In this latest Brand Growth Heroes episode, host Fiona Fitz chats with Stu MacDonald, founder of what's said to be the world's BEST peanut butter... ManiLife.

After years of crossing paths, they finally get to dive deep into Stu’s story—from hand-blending peanut butter in a rugby club kitchen to scaling up and running his own factory.

Stu opens up about the pressures of growth, the realities of burnout, and the difficult decision to step back from running the business in order to help it thrive in a new way.

As well as some REALLY honest, deep and raw stuff from Stu about a period of burnout, you'll hear about:

• The surprising accident that led to Deep Roast Peanut Butter
•  Why 44% of peanut butter sales now come from bulk tubs 
• The mindset shift from being a founder who runs the business to one who supports its growth in a different role 
• The impact of having the right team and how it changes everything

We hope you enjoy one of the most raw and real conversations we've had on the show to date!

Useful Links:

ManiLife website

Stu Macdonald LinkedIn

ManiLife LinkedIn

ManiLife Instagram

ManiLife FB

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Thanks to Brand Growth Heroes’ podcast sponsor - Joelson, the commercial law firm

=============================================================

If you're a founder, you already know how much of your energy goes into building the perfect product, creating standout branding and connecting with your consumers.

But don’t forget that scaling a CPG business also comes with a maze of legal complexities that can make or break your business journey. From contracts, term sheets and regulatory compliance to protecting your brand's intellectual property as you expand, it's essential to get it right.

And that starts with the right legal partner.

So we're thrilled to introduce Joelson, a leading commercial law firm that specialises in guiding the founders of scaling CPG brands, as Brand Growth Heroes' sponsor.

With long term relationships with clients like Little Moons, Trip, Eat Natural, Bear Graze and Pulsin, Joelson is also famous for advising the innocent founders in their landmark sale to Coca-Cola! As a female team, we are especially impressed by Joelson's commitment to championing female founders in CPG.

Not many law firms are also BCorps, nor do they specialise in helping founders navigate the legal challenges of scaling without stifling the creativity and momentum that got you here in the first place...so thanks Joelson - we’re delighted to have you on board.

If you'd like to get in touch to find out more, why don't you drop them a line on hello@joelsonlaw.com!

==============================================

A tiny favour: If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, please could you click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review? 

This small gesture from you means the world to us, and allows us to share these nuggets of insight and value with you more often.

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. 

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

Bio&Me offers consumers a range of granolas, porridges mueslis and yoghurts, all of which are allowed to carry the claim 'Good for your Gut'. In this episode:

• Dr. Megan and Jon tell us why Megan started Bio&Me instead of working with some well-known Big Food brands
• The science behind why Bio&Me was the first to be allowed to say that their products are 'Good for your Gut'
• How business is going now, and where it's going to next!

In this episode, Fiona Fitz chats with Richard Peake, Managing Director of Merchant Gourmet and one of the rare non-founder guests to grace our show. When Richard entered the role, Merchant Gourmet was a £15 million business. Fast forward four years, and the company has doubled its revenue to £30 million. 

Bold innovations, a revamped product range, and strategic market expansion have powered this incredible growth. Our conversation delves into the power of innovation and the importance of staying ahead of consumer trends. Richard shares invaluable lessons in new product development (NPD). One particularly fascinating theme we covered was servant leadership—how Richard and his team drive Merchant Gourmet’s growth by empowering their people and focusing on purpose.

Additionally, we explore how export markets present an exciting new frontier for brands looking to scale. It was also refreshing to hear Richard admit that even seasoned professionals can find brand positioning a challenge. So, if you’ve ever struggled with getting it just right, you’re in good company!

Enjoy the episode, and as always, let us know your thoughts!

=============================================================

 Thanks to Brand Growth Heroes’ podcast sponsor - Joelson, the commercial law firm
=============================================================

If you're a founder, you already know how much of your energy goes into building the perfect product, creating standout branding and connecting with your consumers. 

But don’t forget that scaling a CPG business also comes with a maze of legal complexities that can make or break your business journey. From contracts, term sheets and regulatory compliance to protecting your brand's intellectual property as you expand, it's essential to get it right.

And that starts with the right legal partner. 

So we're thrilled to introduce Joelson, a leading commercial law firm that specialises in guiding the founders of scaling CPG brands, as Brand Growth Heroes' sponsor.

With long term relationships with clients like Little Moons, Trip, Eat Natural, Bear Graze and Pulsin, Joelson is also famous for advising the innocent founders in their landmark sale to Coca-Cola! As a female team, we are especially impressed by Joelson's commitment to championing female founders in CPG.

Not many law firms are also BCorps, nor do they specialise in helping founders navigate the legal challenges of scaling without stifling the creativity and momentum that got you here in the first place...so thanks Joelson - we’re delighted to have you on board.

If you'd like to get in touch to find out more, why don't you drop them a line on hello@joelsonlaw.com!

==============================================

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social kews
ZnmPvZOnCDIffjwMVXXI

Sauce Shop Secrets Unveiled: Pam & James Digva on everything from building their own factory to getting a national listing in Tesco

If you’re ever wondering what it takes to own and run your own manufacturing facility, then this episode is for you.

Brand Growth Heroes host Fiona Fitz has been tasting packaged food and beverage products as part of her job for over 25 years. When she first tasted Sauce Shop's lime and aioli sauce at the Alantra Fast 50 dinner, she knew she had to find out how it tasted so good.

So, in this latest episode, Fiona chats with Sauce Shop's founders, Pam and James Digva, who explain exactly how they make products that taste just like they weren’t made in a factory at ALL.

They have well over 20 years of food manufacturing experience, and there are just so many nuggets in this interview that we can't wait to share with you.

We talk about building your own manufacturing facility while still staying true to the craft, as well as the importance of a dedicated team you can rely on, especially in high growth and challenging times.

During the chat, Pam and James reveal their latest listing in one of the UK's largest retailers. Stay tuned until the end, as this source (sauce!!) of growth will really inspire you.

Useful links:

Sauce Shop® | UK Made Hot Sauce, BBQ Sauce & Ketchup | 35+ varieties

(27) James Digva | LinkedIn

(27) Pam Digva | LinkedIn

Sauce Shop | Facebook

Sauce Shop (@sauce_shop) • Instagram photos and videos

(31)Sauce Shop (@sauceshop) | TikTok

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us across our socials: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme here.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and our social media manager, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

Mid-Day Squares is the Canadian functional chocolate sensation that EVERYONE in the food and drink industry is talking about.

Click the subscribe or 'bell' button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app to make sure you get the latest from Brand Growth
Heroes podcast

Follow Brand Growth Heroes on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Launched in 2018, this family-led business is planning to disrupt the $8 billion dollar health bar market in the USA.

But they're also disrupting what Food & Bev marketers define as best practice, in terms of approach to Social Media!

Forbes 30 under 30 co-founderJake Karls talks Fiona through:

• How he, his sister Lezlie and brother-in-law Nick had been 'swinging and missing' with other startups before Mid-Day Squares was conceived...
• How they ended up with such a great product market fit...
• How they decided on the 1 MASSIVE way the brand would 'show up' to the world...
• How they built the momentum, energy, and hype that means their product is PULLED off shelf...
• Why an understanding of the entertainment world - and story-telling-  is so important to marketers....
• Why Jake didn’t originally want to get involved in this family business...
• His pitch for the brand to 'show-up' as a blend of the best of The Kardashians, the best of Shark Tank, and the best of Elon Musk...
• How to break through the biggest barrier to every F&B business -  the 'Attention Barrier'...
• How you need to be unapologetically yourself, even if 50% of people are going to dislike you...
• The 3 things you need to tell an amazing story...
• The three pillars around which the Mid-Day Squares business is organized...
• How therapy has been the answer to help them run the business successfully...
• How they personalized their relationship with their consumers in the early days, and how they continue to do that at scale...

Want to work with Fiona?
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can help develop your commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Mid-Day Squares Instagram
Mid-Day Squares Tiktok

Minor Figures is the secret success story and insurgent brand that I really wasn't all that aware of before now.
 

At its origin, Minor Figures is a coffee business that was started in 2013 by barista friends Jonathan Chiu, Stuart Forsyth and Will Rixon. But although its original home was in the food service channel, in recent years a tremendous amount of growth has come from the Oatmilk category in Grocery Retail.

The business now has retail sales of around £30M, employs 71 people across 3 offices, and is selling in over 25 countries across the globe.. 

Fiona speaks to Commercial Director Ben Vear, who along with his team has been behind much of this transformational growth.

instagram: https://www.instagram.com/minorfigures/
facebook: https://www.facebook.com/minorfigures

As the founder of Veganuary, Veg Capital, Vegan Fried Chick*n or VFC,  and most recently a new venture capital fund called Sentient Ventures,  Matthew Glover is a business activist and a serial founder whose initiatives have contributed significantly to the changes we are all experiencing in how we eat today.

(Follow Brand Growth Heroes on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin)

In this episode, Matthew shares how he left his career in double-glazing to fight animal cruelty; the exact steps he and his wife took to create the Veganuary movement and, arguably, how it has been the tipping point for the plant-based revolution in our eating habits and in the food industry today. He also tells us why he's made the decision to 'invest in growth up-front' in the VFC (Vegan Fried Chick*n) brand.
Finally, we learn about his venture capital businesses - Veg Capital and Sentient Ventures, including what they look for when evaluating new investments.

I hope you enjoy this latest episode and learn as much as I did recording it!

Get Fiona on your brand team here: The Growth Strategy Programme and Fiona Fitz Consulting

Click the subscribe or 'bell' button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app to make sure you get the latest from Brand Growth Heroes podcast

How do you build a £20M multi-channel business in just 18 months?
Wild deodorant is the sustainable, natural deodorant that smells good and looks great, delivered straight to your door. Founded by childhood friends Freddy Ward and Charlie Bowes-Lyons only 18 months ago, Wild has sold £20M worth of their deodorant in as many months. How did they do that? Fiona gets a masterclass in building a DtoC business from Freddy Ward. Don't miss this one!

Find out more about Wild Deodorant https://www.wearewild.com/
Follow Wild on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/wildrefill/
Discover more about Fiona Fitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fionafitz/
Discover more about the show: https://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/

Want to work with Fiona?

Scaling brands:
Join The Growth Strategy Programme: The only online Business Accelerator for scaling consumer packaged goods brands. Read the testimonials here: https://www.fionafitzconsulting.com/courses/brand-growth-strategy-programme

Start-up brands:
Join Brand Growth Bootcamp Masterclass Membership - A monthly masterclass from Fiona for just £49 ...as well as access to her community of founders of early-stage startup consumer brands https://fionafitzconsulting.mykajabi.com/offers/eRBTBioC/checkout

Thanks to Strong Roots for supporting Series 5 of Brand Growth Heroes.

I've been in love with the bright, punchy and delicious Rude Health brand since it launched in 2006.

Originally a muesli business, Rude Health's revenue now comes predominantly from alt. milks, although this is something Camilla never would have imagined when they first launched them!

A well-known and much-loved brand in 4 major markets, Rude Health is admired for it's brightly coloured boxes and cartons which inject joy into mornings across the U.K, Portugal & Benelux.

Co-founder Camilla Barnard began the business 18 years ago with her ex-husband, with the intention of making healthier eating a celebration, not a sacrifice for as many people as they could. Compared to the expectations of many founders starting out today, you could say that the business has grown relatively slowly, however there's a massive upside to this: Rude Health is still over 90% privately owned, with their only 'major' minor shareholder being....PepsiCo!

Here are the Top 9 things you'll learn :

1. Camilla didn't know much about running a product-based business, let alone a food business, before she started, and why this mattered.
2. How Rude Health's earliest vision was always MASSIVE: to make healthy eating a celebration, not a sacrifice.
3. How Camilla is obsessed asking the right questions to her shoppers, consumers and retail buyers, and learn how you can do this too. 
4. What the brand-design process for the Rude Health brand looked like, in detail.
5. What the 'clothing' your brand wears says about it in terms of when and how to use it, and whether it's for you or not...
6. Why Rude Health has chosen to play mainly in Grocery Retail and not Online 
7. How Rude health split their marketing budget now vs. 3 years ago
8. The role of new product development in their business and how this has changed over time
9. How to recruit the right people for your business - is it skill, experience or mindset?

Could you #Payitforward?
If you enjoy this episode & it has helped you in some way, will you take 3 mins to leave a review on your podcast app?
This small gift from you has a big impact on me ... and on my business.
 Thank you 🙏

Don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses!
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community! Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme

Email Fiona for a 1-1 coaching session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com

See how Fiona can help you design and develop group-coaching programmes for your senior commercial and marketing teams: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Tribe is the UK's leading plant-based performance brand, offering a range of bars, active oats and shakes that are super tasty and appeal to more than just serious fitness fanatics.

But more importantly, Tribe is an *Impact* organisation that began in 2013 with a community long-distance 'Run for Love' to set up the first home for trafficked children in the UK. The product range was launched only after the community had already found a life of it's own, and sales gained serious traction at the beginning of lockdown. With the brand doubling in size, it's now about to hit £6 million in retail sales value at the end of this year. 

Tribe really is more than your average challenger brand. It's an ecosystem that includes their food business + their charitable organisation 'The Tribe Freedom Foundation' + the active community the founders have built since their very first run for love in 2013.

I think Tribe has all the makings of a future mega-brand. Why?
- It appeals to a potentially very large market of active people who want to enjoy their food, while making modern choices around nutrition, and ensuring their choices also help people & planet. 
- It shows up with a clear and consistent point of view. It started with a social mission, ergo the mission at the centre of the brand is authentic.  
- It's visually appealing and has lots of stand-out on-shelf in the categories it's in. 
- It's a cross-category brand with a consistent value proposition.
- It's plant-based....but delicious. 

This is one to watch.

TRIP is the UK's best-selling CBD drinks company. Since its launch in 2019, UK consumers have spent literally millions of pounds on TRIP's delicious CBD infused canned drinks, as well as on their dinky little dropper bottles of CBD oils. 

Fiona speaks to co-founder Olivia Ferdi about leaving her law career to step into the unknown, about how she and her husband have created a mainstream category out of something that had tremendous barriers to purchase up until now, and we learn how the TRIP team have had to drive demand in the old fashioned way through experience and word of mouth rather than through paid advertising. 

Episode 69: Freja Foods, Founder Ed Armitage

How to Hit a £10m Run Rate in 3 Years!

In this latest episode, Fiona talks to Ed Armitage, founder of Freja Bone Broth, who shares the secrets behind his award-winning, digital-first, scaling food business. 
With a vision to become Europe's No. 1 bone broth brand, you'll hear how husband and wife team Ed and Jess built a multi-million-pound brand in just over three years - during extremely difficult economic conditions. 
Investors like Harry Cain, the ex-MD of innocent smoothies Giles Brook and the ex CEO Unilever Paul Polman, have all invested in the business, find out why here!

By the way, we do a quick-fire Q&A at the end, and Ed is incredibly generous with his tips on how to grow a Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) brand profitably, so make sure you stay around and don’t miss these valuable nuggets.

Here are the top 5 things you will learn from this episode:

• How Ed and Jess have built a business that turned over £1M in the first four weeks of 2024 alone!
• Why Harry Cain, the ex-MD of innocent smoothies Giles Brook ex CEO Unilever have all invested in the business
• How a digital-first brand allows them to avoid the gate-keepers that make business hard in retail grocery
• How to overcome the challenges that most consumer brand startups face 
• Ed’s 'turnover per full-time employee' Rule of thumb' that steers you on how many people to employ 

I hope you enjoyed this episode and that it has helped you and your business in some way!
If it has, please hit FOLLOW to subscribe and keep an eye out for the next episode, where I'll talk to another successful founder of a challenger brand who will share more valuable insights into driving growth. Your FOLLOW makes a big difference to me and to my business, thank you.
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes by finding it on your favourite podcast app here.

Useful links:

Freja's Website

Find the founders on LinkedIn: Jessica Higgins & Ed Armitage

Freja on Instagram

Freja on Facebook

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success! 

Follow us on social: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, X and TikTok.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme here.

Thanks to my Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and my producer, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

If you're the founder of a scaling brand, you've likely thought about selling your business. But when should you start preparing, and how do you find the right buyer?

In this episode, we discuss mergers and acquisitions with Charles Lanceley, Managing Director of Alantra's consumer team. Alantra is a leading investment bank specialising in consumer brands. 

Charles has worked on major deals, including Fuel 10K, Strong Roots, and Grenade, and shares what makes a brand valuable—from strong financials to a compelling investment story.

He explains why building a business solely to sell is a mistake and how focusing too much on an exit can hurt your chances of achieving a great one. You’ll learn why being ‘for sale’ is never ideal, how the best deals happen behind the scenes, and why top M&A advisors don’t just find buyers—they already know who’s in the market.

We also cover common founder mistakes, like underestimating due diligence and not preparing for the workload of an exit. Charles highlights how an advisor can ease this process, letting founders stay focused on running their business—because if performance dips, so does the deal’s value.

Finally, we discuss how private equity and trade buyers view businesses differently, the impact of market cycles, and why the best way to maximise your exit is to build a brand buyers can’t ignore. 

Whether you're considering selling soon or just want to create a lasting brand, this episode is packed with essential insights. Enjoy!

Useful links:

Connect with Charles on LinkedIn

Learn more about Alantra   

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Thanks to Brand Growth Heroes’ podcast sponsor - Joelson, the commercial law firm

=========================================

If you're a founder, you already know how much of your energy goes into building the perfect product, creating standout branding and connecting with your consumers.

But don’t forget that scaling a CPG business also comes with a maze of legal complexities that can make or break your business journey. From contracts, term sheets and regulatory compliance to protecting your brand's intellectual property as you expand, it's essential to get it right.

And that starts with the right legal partner.

So we're thrilled to introduce Joelson, a leading commercial law firm that specialises in guiding the founders of scaling CPG brands, as Brand Growth Heroes' sponsor.

With long-term relationships with clients like Little Moons, Trip, Eat Natural, Bear Graze, and Pulsin, Joelson is also famous for advising the innocent founders in their landmark sale to Coca-Cola! As a female team, we are especially impressed by Joelson's commitment to championing female founders in CPG.

Not many law firms are also BCorps, nor do they specialise in helping founders navigate the legal challenges of scaling without stifling the creativity and momentum that got you here in the first place. So thanks, Joelson—we’re delighted to have you on board.

If you'd like to get in touch to find out more, why don't you drop them a line at hello@joelsonlaw.com!

=========================================

A tiny favour: If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, please could you click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review?

This small gesture from you means the world to us, and allows us to share these nuggets of insight and value with you more often.

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

Are you curious to know what it's like for a founder in the week before a sale of their business?

➡ If you're building your consumer packaged goods business with the hope of one day selling it, and if you've ever wondered what it would be like to sell your branded business, then you've got to listen to this. Last week, FUEL10K (protein breakfast range) was sold to renowned UK CPG business Premier Foods.

In a two part series, Brand Growth Heroes host Fiona Fitzpatrick talks to Barney😜 Mauleverer about:

- How he & his team BUILT FUEL10K

- Why it was the right FIT for Premier Foods, and

- What it was like for him in the WEEK BEFORE the sale of the business at the end of October 2023.

First up - we revisit our episode with Barney from 2020, where the business was already turning over £12M in revenue and present in multiple international markets. 

Barney Mauleverer cut his teeth in food and drink during the front five years of early stage Innocent Drinks. Leaving in 2006 as European Manager, Barney sought a more entrepreneurial route of his own and set up food brand exporting company Fresh Marketing with pal Alex Matheson.

Listen to how Barney and his team built the Fuel 10K business, and in the next episode launching soon, we'll explore what it took to sell the business to Premier Foods.

A favour! Could you #Payitforward?
I really hope that you enjoyed this episode & that it has helped you in some way!
If so, would you take 3 mins to click FOLLOW on your podcast app, as well as leave a review?
This small gift from you has a big impact on me ... and on MY business.
Thank you 🙏

Don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses!
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme

In 2016, Tenzing was the first Natural Energy drink to be launched on to the UK market, and for the past few years, it has been the LEADING Energy drink in terms of growth, and is (at time of recording) turning over between £5-6M in UK retail sales.

It's founder, Huib van Buckel has an illustrious career in Energy Drinks, including 8 years at Red Bull, where he was Head of Marketing for Holland, UK and Europe. So there is TONS we can learn from him.

In this video and audio episode you'll learn:

• How Huib explored the market opportunity for his idea of a plant-based, naturally-sourced energy drink, with 60% less sugar.
• How he came up with the name and the concept for Tenzing (circa 4.40 youtube)
• What "Chipping away at Growth" means to Huib and why it works (circa 11.39)
• Huib's philosphy on teams & managing people, and what it's like to work at Tenzing, where you can choose your own boss (circa 30mins)
• Why Huib doesn't buy many of the marketing myths that are peddled by some of the big name Marketing gurus like Mark Ritson or Simon Sinek (39mins)

Youtube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkZzsoJx3-OtZ_zRViEG3CA
Brand Growth Heroes Website: https://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/

If you work in the food industry, you need to start swotting up on this subject area:
 **Regenerative Agriculture**
 
(Follow Brand Growth Heroes on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin)

Wildfarmed is a regenerative food brand bringing together farmers, food businesses and consumers to build the largest soil and biodiversity restoration programme on British arable land. But uniquely, they are making delicious food grown in healthy soils widely available to the high street customer, whilst guaranteeing a stable price committed to the farmer who makes the transition to regenerative practices.

Fiona speaks to Edd Lees, who along with Andy Cato of Groove Armada and George Lamb, is one of the co-founders of this revolutionary new business.

Founded in 2018, Wildfarmed’s overriding premise is to 'fix the planet by fixing food'. 

Wildfarmed prioritises soil health and never uses pesticides, herbicides or fungicides, so the land is left rich for future harvests. This in turn ensures that any Wildfarmed loaf of bread will always be chemical-free and nutrient-dense. There are now 40 farmers growing under contract with Wildfarmed (with an ever-growing waitlist), representing a staggering 1% of British arable land.

Wildfarmed’s first ever bakery partner was Jolene in Newington Green, London and soon Pizza Pilgrims, HIDE, Twelve Triangles, all joined the movement. They’re now up to a total of nearly 230 customers who bake, cook and educate consumers through using Wildfarmed flour.

If you work in the food industry, how can you engage with regenerative farming practices?

Find out more about Wildfarmed here. and on mob here

Get Fiona on your brand team here: The Growth Strategy Programme and Fiona Fitz Consulting

Don't miss further episodes!
Click the subscribe or 'bell' button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app to make sure you get the latest from Brand Growth Heroes podcast

Nice describes itself as a 'Future Wine Company'. This modern, accessible brand offers wine in cans AND in boxes, so that you can have a great glass of wine wherever you are... without having to buy or open a whole bottle. 

Founders Lucy Wright and Jeremy May talk to Fiona about their massive multi-channel growth since launch, about the consumer and trade customer frictions that they're solving, about how they approached their recent round of funding and finally about the importance they place on people and culture.

Over the past 20 months, Little Moons has become a national obsession. Although the company was founded in 2010, the brand has only recently brought transformational growth to the nation's favourite frozen category, and now sells tens of millions of pounds of their delicious mochi ice cream across all major supermarkets and foodservice channels... and employs over 300 people.
We talk to sister and brother founders Vivian and Howard Wong about their manufacturing journey; how food service was the right channel for them to build their business initially, and about the business impact of 320 million views on TikTok.

Ever been embarrassed at the till buying condoms?! 
This week, Fiona Fitz is joined by Farah Kabir and Sarah Welsh, the brilliant duo behind HANX, a scaling challenger brand in the sexual wellness category.
Farah and Sarah turned an awkward personal experience into a market-leading company by spotting a glaring gap in the female-focused sexual health market. They've now built a brand that, although it started in condoms, has evolved to support women throughout all stages of their lives, addressing the various ways that women's bodies change and show up at different ages.

They're securing distribution in major retailers like Boots, Tesco, and Sainsbury's and are even making waves in the U.S. with Urban Outfitters.

HANX is evolving beyond just being a condom brand—it's becoming a comprehensive women's health and wellness brand.

So why not see how it's done in a category that might be very different from the one you operate in?  

Note: Sarah was moving between locations during the recording, so you might notice video and sound quality changes throughout the episode.

By the way, if you're listening to this on Spotify, you'll find a place where it says ASK A QUESTION.

You can ask Fiona a question, and she will be able to answer you. So, if you have any questions about this episode or anything you thought helpful, please let Fiona know!

Useful links

HANX website

HANX LinkedIn

Farah Kabir LinkedIn

Sarah Welsh LinkedIn

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us across our socials: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme here.

Thanks to my Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

In this latest episode of Brand Growth Heroes, Fiona sits down with the inspirational human being Ruby Raut, the founder and CEO of WUKA (Wake Up, Kick-Ass), to discuss her remarkable story from growing up in Nepal, where menstruation was shrouded in taboo, to creating a brand that is revolutionising the Fem Care category, and giving dignity back to girls and women every month.

Ruby’s background in environmental science and her passion for sustainability inspired her to create WUKA, a brand offering sustainable, leak-proof period underwear that drives positive change in the Femtech space.

Ruby highlights WUKA’s incredible milestones, from becoming the first period underwear brand to hit supermarket shelves in the UK to successfully campaigning to remove VAT on these essential products.

She opens up about the grit and determination it took to bring her ideas to life, from cleaning toilets at the 2012 Olympics to founding a pioneering company.

What we loved learning in this episode

• A world-class example of how authentic business purpose can inspire true innovation and customer loyalty.
• Insights into the process of developing sustainable products
• How focusing on a single SKU instead of a complete range can keep things simple - for you and for your shopper
• Practical advice for entrepreneurs on overcoming challenges, keeping costs down, and focusing on social impact.

Find out today how and why Ruby Raut is reshaping the future of period care for millions.

By the way, if you're listening to this on Spotify, you'll find a place where it says ASK A QUESTION.

You can ask Fiona a question, and she will be able to answer you. So, if you have any questions about this episode or anything you thought helpful, please let Fiona know!

Useful links

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ruby-raut-49987b58/

WUKA website

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us across our socials: Brand Growth Heroes on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and X.

Sign up for the latest news and information on the Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme here.

Thanks to my Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

waterdrop® is the $100M insurgent beverage brand that may not yet be on your radar...at least if you're based in the U.K.
But you need to be all over it...here's why:

What is waterdrop®?
(Follow Brand Growth Heroes on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin)
waterdrop® is a 'microdrink' company that offers dissolvable cubes of flavour that you can carry with you and drop into tap water whenever you want a drink. Their flavour-cubes are plant-based, sugar-free, and even include vitamins, teas and energy. From a marketing strategy point of view, the cube becomes a carrier to deliver solutions to many different types of people, needs and occasions.

waterdrop®'s purpose is to make it easy for everyone to drink more tap water, more often. The ecosystem of products and 'water-tech' that the company is building in order to deliver on its purpose is so clever that your eyes will water.  They are present in 14 countries, and have 25 waterdrop® stores across the world, including a presence in supermarkets and high street beauty stores, as well as concessions in shopping malls. Believe it or not, they are now the largest seller of drinkware in Europe...and they've just launched an intelligent water bottle cap so you can keep track of how much water you're drinking.

The business performance stats are astonishing too. In under 5 years, the company has turned over $100M, with over north of 100M drinks sold. They’ve recently raised a series B round of $60M, to invest in conquering the US market.

We talk to founder Martin Murray about why and how he started the company, the mistakes he made along the way…and something I know you’re going to love – how martin and his co-founders persuaded their co-manufacturers to pay for the machinery and trials they needed to make waterdrop cubes a reality.

What you'll learn in this episode:
- How Martin came up with the idea for waterdrop® while he was on an aeroplane with his mother
- Why it made NO sense for anyone to try and do what they did...
- How they got their co-manufacturer to pay for their R&D and machinery, each time they needed to scale.
- How they are aiming to help more people to drink more clean water, more easily.
- Why D2C was a blue ocean for beverages
- How to create massive barriers to entry to the market you've created
- Why you should never accept the status quo

Find out more about waterdrop® here.
Get Fiona on your brand team here: The Growth Strategy Programme and Fiona Fitz Consulting

Don't miss further episodes! Click the subscribe or 'bell' button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app to make sure you get the latest from Brand Growth Heroes podcast

Get ready for a dose of entrepreneurial truth bombs as the vivacious trailblazer, Amelia Christie-Miller, spills the beans on one of the blunders she made whilst venturing towards business triumph! Bold Bean Co.

YOU too can be featured on Brand Growth Bloopers! Just send me a WhatsApp on +447418605547 and tell me the following:

• Your name
• Your brand website and Instagram handle
• A quick outline of your brand growth blooper, for example, 'manufacturing disaster, wrong ingredients' or 'no laptop power at a Tesco buyer meeting' etc
• What's in it for you? If you are chosen to feature on the show, you'll have the opportunity to share your brand growth blooper story as well as sharing your website, instagram and LinkedIn handles to thousands of listeners around the world. You could even do what Simona Deifta did in one of our first bonus episodes, and share a coupon code so that listeners can buy your product with an exclusive discount!

So that you don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses,
click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app (on apple podcasts it's three dots like this (...)

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can group-coach your senior commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

Sam Dennigan gives Fiona the latest news from Strong Roots HQ, explaining the backstory to their new TV ad; why they've sold a minority stake in the business to McCain Foods; and together Fiona & Sam announce a big piece of shared news: not only is Strong Roots sponsoring Brand Growth Heroes Series 5, but Sam also announces that he is offering a bursary for 2 founders to join The Growth Strategy Programme, Brand Growth Heroes' online business accelerator for the founders of scaling CPG brands.

Brand Growth Heroes catches up with Sam and Strong Roots every 6 months or so. So if you want to follow the growth journey of an insurgent CPG brand in real-time, then check out Strong Root's other interviews on back episodes of Brand Growth Heroes: There's one in Sept 2021, May 2020 and June 2019.

If you're the founder of a scaling consumer goods brand and you'd like to work with Fiona to drive growth for your business, check out The Growth Strategy Programme at https://www.fionafitzconsulting.com/courses/brand-growth-strategy-programme

If it's too early for The Growth Strategy Programme, why not consider joining Brand Growth Bootcamp - Masterclass Membership group. 

See you there!

Not happy with the alcohol free beers on the market, Luke Boase spent 741 days in research, travelled over 7,500 miles and brewed nearly 60,000 litres of beer before he came up with what he calls the definitive alcohol free lager, which he called Lucky Saint. The  multi award winning 0.5% pilsner launched in the On-trade in October 2013... And after only a year, Lucky Saint. was listed in over 1500 venues, including over 30 Michelin star restaurants and casual dining institutions like Dish Room, the Ivy Collection and Honest Burgers. It was also the first alcohol free lager to launch on draught in January 2020 and 50 pubs and bars across London. 

Learn how Luke and his Managing Director Emma Heal (ex innocent, Graze) pivoted their out-of-home business model right at the start of the pandemic, to drive #transformationalgrowth.

You may not know their names yet, but you certainly know the first of their €50M brands.
Niall McGrath and Tom Gannon are legends in the Irish Consumer Goods industry, but in all fairness, they should actually be named and recognised as Consumer Goods brand-legends globally.
The Founders of Fulfil Nutrition protein bars, they built this business to €60M in the 2 years after launch, and ranking in the Top 5 brands in Ireland.
How did they do this? They are proud to have taken a systematic, strategic approach to brand building, an almost geeky dedication to The 4Ps and Byron Sharp's rules for Brand Growth.  Listen and weep at just how systematic serious success might need to be!
Cali Cali Foods
Instagram Cali Cali
Fulfil Nutrition

In the 'No & Low' alcohol category, Seedlip is arguably the original poster child of insurgent brands. Started on a garden table in 2016, it quickly became the world's No 1 distilled non-alcoholic brand. It now sells across 49 countries and has an undisclosed market sales value in the £10s of millions of pounds.

In this episode, founder Ben Branson talks to Fiona about how he developed one of the ultimate disruptive brands; why he got into bed with Big Co (Diageo) so early on; and he talks us through the disruptive way he approaches building culture, people, roles and teams.

They also chat about robot chefs, about how there are 47,000 plant-based ingredients available out there...and Ben tells us about some big, exciting plans for Seedlip coming down the line.

Find out more about Seedlip - and try some! https://www.seedlipdrinks.com/en-us/
Follow Seedlip on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/seedlipdrinks/
Discover more about Fiona Fitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fionafitz/
Discover more about the show: https://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/

Want to work with Fiona? Discover her programmes for the founders of consumer/grocery brands below:
The Growth Strategy Programme: The only online Business Accelerator for scaling consumer packaged goods brands. Read the testimonials here: https://www.fionafitzconsulting.com/courses/brand-growth-strategy-programme
Brand Growth Bootcamp Masterclass Membership - Fiona's group for founders of early-stage startup consumer brands https://fionafitzconsulting.mykajabi.com/offers/eRBTBioC/checkout

Thanks to Strong Roots for supporting series 5 of Brand Growth Heroes.

COOK is an award winning frozen meals company based in the UK.  It’s impressive turnover of £130M comes from its it 98 retail stores and 1000 concessions that it supplies from its own manufacturing facilities.  Yet some 28 years from inception, the business STILL doesn’t sell to any major UK grocery retailers!

Founder Ed Perry tells me how he has managed to keep the business 100% privately owned, how their passion for creating a great company culture plays a central role in what they do, and how- to achieve their mission- they still cook using the same ingredients and techniques that a good cook would use at home in order

Here are the top 5 things you'll learn :

1. COOK started with just 1 store in 2006, and now has over 1600 employees and a turnover of £130M...yet is still 100% privately owned!
2. How COOK's core brand promise is the driving force behind their success
3. How the company's RAW TALENT program strives to help people rebuild their lives and contribute positively to society
4. Why Ed advises believes you have to measure your company culture
5. How building a business for the long term can give you the freedom to make decisions that can lead to better outcomes for society as a whole

A favour! Could you #Payitforward?
I really hope that you enjoyed this episode & that it has helped you in some way!
If so, would you take 3 mins to click FOLLOW on your podcast app, as well as leave a review?
This small gift from you has a big impact on me ... and on MY business.
Thank you 🙏

Don't miss your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses!
Click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme

If you’re thinking about building the kind of food business that creates its very own category, where it continues to win for years to come, then you need to listen to this episode where we interview Cullen Allen, co-founder of Ireland’s original insurgent food brand, Cully & Sully.

In this interview, you’re going to learn what an obsession with product really means; the common mistakes that Cullen has seen prove fatal for many scaling food brands over the past 20 years; and what it’s like to love going to bed with your investor every day.

Launched in 2004, Cully and Sully soups, broths and pies are still market leaders in Ireland, but also racing up the ladder as the challenger brand in UK Chilled Soup, where their delicious range of soups is available in over 5000 stores nationwide. (Tesco, Co-op, Asda).

https://cullyandsully.com/our-meals

The pea soup Cully mentions during the interview:
tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/268045486

In this latest episode of Brand Growth Heroes, we’re over the moon (as always) to welcome back one of our favourite guests, Ben Greensmith, Country Manager for the UK and Ireland of Tony’s Chocolonely.

Since we last chatted to Ben on the show, Tony’s Chocolonely has not only achieved impressive sales growth in the UK but has also made remarkable strides in driving positive change within the cocoa industry.

In this episode, Ben and Fiona dive deep into the progress Tony’s Chocolonely has made, covering:

• Their growth and performance and market share in the UK
• Exciting new product launches and brand innovations
• But most importantly, the impact of Tony’s Open Chain on the Cocoa industry.

We also discuss the brand’s unique approach to marketing, including:

• The learnings from their Advent Calendar launch
• The UK Sweet Solutions campaign that captured media attention
• Balancing awareness of critical cocoa supply chain issues with Tony’s playful tone of voice—all while reminding consumers just how delicious their chocolate tastes
• What’s happening next?

Useful Links:

• Tony’s Chocolonely Website
• Tony's Chocolonely LinkedIn
• Ben Greensmith LinkedIn
• Follow Tony’s Chocolonely on Instagram
• Follow Tony’s Chocolonely on Facebook

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

If you find Brand Growth Heroes episodes useful, then imagine spending 12 weeks on a Mini MBA programme run by host Fiona Fitz: The Brand Growth Heroes Mini MBA 2025 powered by Alantra will be open for applications on January 6th.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

Did you know that 1 billion women globally are menopausal at any given time? 
Yet, until recently, the retail industry has largely overlooked this audience. 
Well....that’s all about to change!

In this episode of Brand Growth Heroes, we explore the groundbreaking work of GenM, the menopause partner for brands and retailers, and its mission to reshape how women shop for menopause-friendly products.

Our latest #BGH guest, Heather Jackson (CEO and co-founder of GenM), is the unstoppable force behind GenM. She shares how GenM is pioneering the MTick accreditation—a universal shopping symbol that helps women find products proven to support their menopause journey. With major players like Tesco, Boots, Sainsbury’s, Unilever, and Procter & Gamble already on board, this is more than just a trend—it’s a retail revolution.

This episode explores how GenM convinced top retailers and brands to take menopause seriously and why menopause-friendly shopping is a permanent category, not a passing fad.

We discuss the commercial opportunity for brands that get it right, the science-backed credibility of the MTick accreditation, and the groundbreaking launch of Tesco’s first-ever permanent menopause-friendly aisle.

Heather shares eye-opening insights, including the startling reality that only 5% of women feel confident navigating menopause, and just 2% feel they are thriving. With 86% of women seeking non-HRT solutions, the demand for menopause-friendly products has never been greater.

Why You Should Listen: If you're a founder, brand leader, or retailer, this episode is a must-listen. The menopause market isn’t niche—it’s 20% of your customer base and finally getting the visibility it deserves.
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A small favour: If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, please hit FOLLOW and even leave a review! This tiny gesture means the world to us and allows us to share these nuggets of insight and value with you more often. We see every new follower and read every review, so thank you in advance!

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Useful Links:

• Learn more about GenM and the MTIC accreditation
• Follow Heather Jackson on LinkedIn

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Thanks to Brand Growth Heroes’ podcast sponsor - Joelson, the commercial law firm

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If you're a founder, you already know how much of your energy goes into building the perfect product, creating standout branding and connecting with your consumers.

But don’t forget that scaling a CPG business also comes with a maze of legal complexities that can make or break your business journey. From contracts, term sheets and regulatory compliance to protecting your brand's intellectual property as you expand, it's essential to get it right.

And that starts with the right legal partner.

So we're thrilled to introduce Joelson, a leading commercial law firm that specialises in guiding the founders of scaling CPG brands, as Brand Growth Heroes' sponsor.

With long-term relationships with clients like Little Moons, Trip, Eat Natural, Bear Graze, and Pulsin, Joelson is also famous for advising the innocent founders in their landmark sale to Coca-Cola! As a female team, we are especially impressed by Joelson's commitment to championing female founders in CPG.

Not many law firms are also BCorps, nor do they specialise in helping founders navigate the legal challenges of scaling without stifling the creativity and momentum that got you here in the first place. So thanks, Joelson—we’re delighted to have you on board.

If you'd like to get in touch to find out more, why don't you drop them a line at hello@joelsonlaw.com!

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A tiny favour: If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, please could you click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review?

This small gesture from you means the world to us, and allows us to share these nuggets of insight and value with you more often.

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth.

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS.

 As the founder or leader of a grocery brand, have you ever thought it would be GREAT to pool your central costs with other brands like yours?

Follow Brand Growth Heroes here on Instagram, Tiktok, Linkedin

I certainly considered it when I was launching GU Chocolate Puds in France years ago, and as a result,  I created a shared field sales team with Innocent France for the French market, and it was certainly something worth doing for the period of time it worked for both businesses.

I wanted to explore what this looks like today, so in this next episode, I talk to Ben Arib, founder of Rebel Kitchen, and more recently Nurture Brands, a cohort of eight better-for-you brands - Rebel Kitchen & Myracle Kitchen, Primal Pantry, Doisy & Dam, Emily, Jax Coco, Indie Ba - that share the same platform (and equity) in order to mutualize a lot of their costs.

Ben explains how the Nurture Brands' shared model works, why he started it, and all the economics behind it.

So that you don't miss the leaders of your favourite brands talk about how they grew their inspirational businesses, click the Follow button beside Brand Growth Heroes on your podcast app (on apple podcasts it's three dots like this (...)

Become part of the Brand Growth Heroes community!
Sign up here for news and information on Brand Growth Heroes Accelerator Programme
Email Fiona for a 1-1 session: fiona@fionafitzconsulting.com
See how Fiona can group-coach your senior commercial and marketing teams internally: Fiona Fitz Consulting

In the latest episode of Brand Growth Heroes, Fiona Fitz sits down with Craig Allen, the founder of Gold Standard Nutrition (GSN), who joins us from Selby, York. GSN has become a standout brand for its high-quality, healthy, and convenient frozen meals that taste amazing!

At just 21, Craig launched GSN with a bold vision, growing it into a multi-million-pound business—all without any external funding.

The idea for GSN was born 12 years ago during a family outing to a local Chinese restaurant with his Dad. That “light bulb” moment set Craig on a pathway to create a brand that thrives today as a case study in profitability, brand growth, and focused strategy.

In this episode, Craig shares the triumphs and challenges of his entrepreneurial journey, highlighting how staying true to his vision and focusing on overlooked market opportunities propelled his success. Enjoy!

Useful Links:

• Craig Allen LinkedIn
• GSN website
• GSN Facebook
• GSN Instagram

Key Takeaways

Spotting a Market Opportunity

• Craig reveals how he identified a gap in the high-protein, healthy frozen meals market and turned it into a thriving business.

The Bootstrapping Journey

• Building GSN without external funding wasn’t easy. Craig discusses the challenges and rewards of starting and scaling a business from scratch.

Hard Lessons in Business

• An early hurdle forced Craig to downsize his team, teaching him valuable lessons about thoughtful growth, self-belief, and sound financial planning.
• Cash flow management became a critical takeaway after hard-won experiences.

Staying Focused in Entrepreneurship

• Craig’s journey underscores the importance of adaptability, clarity of vision, and self-belief, even when navigating competitive pressures.

The “Where-to-Play” Strategy

• GSN thrives by serving underserved markets—like police stations, gyms, and universities—rather than competing directly in crowded grocery aisles. This strategic focus has been a cornerstone of the brand’s growth and scalability.

Responding to Market Needs

• GSN’s rebrand from Goldstein Nutrition to GSN reflects a strategic pivot to resonate with mainstream audiences. This move expanded its appeal beyond bodybuilders, championing an inclusive vision for healthy eating.

Looking Ahead: GSN’s Future Growth Potential

• Craig’s commitment to “doing things properly” underpins the brand’s success, and he shares exciting plans for the next phase of GSN’s journey.

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

The Brand Growth Heroes Mini MBA Powered by Alantra has opened (Jan 6th) - apply here!

Please don't hesitate to join our Brand Growth Heroes community to stay updated with captivating stories and learnings from your beloved brands on their path to success!

Follow us on our Brand Growth Heroes socials: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Thanks to our Sound Engineer, Gyp Buggane, Ballagroove.com and podcast producer/content creator, Kathryn Watts, Social KEWS

Listen and learn from Joanna Jensen, the founder of Child's Farm!

This multi-award-winning natural skincare brand was founded (like 99% of businesses born to female founders) from Joanna's own need for something that didn't exist in the category at the time: a bath time solution for her child with medically diagnosed eczema.

Created in 2010, Childs Farm was the number-one brand in the category by 2019 (ahead of Johnson's Baby, Baby Dove, and Aveeno).

Joanna scaled the business to £20 million and decided the time was right to source additional funding for growth, but instead sold to PZ Cussons, which owns brands Imperial Leather, St Tropez and Carex.

She describes herself as a driven workaholic, but she is also a brilliant mentor and advocate of female founders and female-founded businesses. She is also an investor in some of the businesses we've had on the show, including Freya Bone Broth and Hunter and Gather (look for their episodes on the show page of your favourite podcast player)

During their chat, Joanna gives us many of what Fiona calls "those £500k ‘aha’ moments", including advice on margins, cash flow, when to hire and at what level, what to look for in your team, and more.

Fiona’s challenge - how do we all get to the point where we're clear that the solution we're offering doesn't exist out there? Then, we can enter any negotiation, whether with a buyer or an investor, and we feel just as confident as Joanna does.

By the way, if you're listening to this on Spotify, you'll find a place where it says ASK A QUESTION! You can now ask Fiona a question, and she will be able to answer you. So, if you have any questions about this episode or anything you thought helpful, please let Fiona know!

Useful links:

Childs Farm website

Childs Farm Instagram

Childs Farm Facebook

EIS Association

Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme

Stop It by comedian Bob Newhart

If this episode inspires you to think about new ways to drive business growth, don't forget to click FOLLOW or SUBSCRIBE on your favourite podcast app and leave a review!

You won’t want to miss the next episode, in which Fiona Fitz talks with another successful founder of a challenger brand who shares more valuable insights into driving growth. Plus, your small gesture will be truly appreciated.

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Natasha Bowes, the founder of innovative Kefir company Biotiful Dairy, shares the spellbinding business story behind the brand's success.  It's a story that highlights the dedication, hard work, and obsessional focus on product quality that's necessary to become a brand leader in today's competitive marketplace. With a portfolio of 7 ranges and market retail sales value of around £30M, this is a brand we're going to see a lot more of in the future.

At the start of this episode we advertise The Growth Strategy Programme. Here’s the link to sign up for a discovery call and
Recruiting NOW for June/July Cohort:
https://www.fionafitzconsulting.com/courses/brand-growth-strategy

How do you grow a branded beverage business that is described by the The Grocer magazine as the brand that the traditional category brand leaders now have to challenge?

Dash Water is a delicious range of canned infused sparkling water without any sugar or sweetener, made with wonky fruit and veg and thereby saving hundreds of tons of food waste every year!

Founded in 2017 by Alex Wright and Jack Scott, both originally from farming backgrounds, Dash's retail sales are tracking at around £10M, and the brand boasts the leading market share in its category (37%).

Dash is now available in 5,000 stores across the EU. In the UK you can find Dash at Sainsbury's, British Airways, Boots, Ocado and Amazon. 

In this episode we talk about the importance of sustainability at the core of their business,  about how Alex and Jack invested a lot of time and shoe-leather driving brand awareness and trial from the ground up, as well exploring their very recent launch into the Soda Water market.

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Serial founder and bestselling author Mike Stevens talks to Fiona about his new book 'The Direct-To-Consumer Playbook', and shares his learnings from 20 years in consumer packaged goods - and from being one of the first challenger food brands to sell directly to consumers.

Hear how Mike and his co-founder built a successful DTC business with Peppersmith; why he sold the business; how and why he went about writing his best-selling business book; the secrets to winning at DTC straight from the mouths of the most successful founders and brands in this space...and finally, what Mike would do differently, knowing what he knows now.

What you'll learn :

• When DTC is right for your business - and when it ISN'T. 
• What you NEED to figure out to make DTC work financially for your business
• The importance of talking to your consumers on the phone or in-person every week
• What Mike means by 'Having a Brand that Can Tell the Story'
• Why multi-channel is often crucial to winning
• What successful challenger brands are DOING DIFFERENTLY and what YOU can take from their strategies and implement in your own business...NOW.
• What Mike would do differently with all this knowledge and experience under his belt.

Find Mike's book here.
Meet Mike at Bread and Jam Fest here
Come to Fiona's workshop at Bread and Jam Fest here

James McMaster, CEO of insurgent brand Huel, describes his experience of driving transformational growth at 3 well-known global food brands. He talks about how mindset beats skill-set, the importance of choosing the right people, and how transformational brand can radically change both consumer and shopper behaviour. http://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/2019/01/03/episode-3-interview-with-james-mc-master-ceo-of-huel/

Your host Fiona Fitzpatrick of Fiona Fitz Consulting introduces the New 4Ps of Transformational Growth in Consumer Goods Categories: People (or the kinds of people who work for the company), Process (or how the job to-be-done gets both defined and approached), Category Positioning (or where the brand positions itself relative to the competition) and finally, the Brand and Product Promise. http://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/2019/01/02/episode-2-introducing-the-new-4ps-of-transformational-growth/

Fiona Fitz and Professor Dr Jan-Benedict Steenkamp, author, distinguished scholar and one of the world’s leading experts in the Consumer Packaged Goods industry, discuss what's worrying large Consumer Packaged Goods companies about driving organic growth. Professor Steenkamp suggests three things large CPG companies should be doing differently. http://www.brandgrowthheroes.com/2019/02/01/episode-4-interview-with-jan-benedict-steenkamp-leading-expert-consumer-goods-industries/

In this episode we talk to Sam Dennigan, Founder and CEO of the UK’s Fastest Growing Food Brand, Strong Roots. Strong Roots is a super-successful frozen food brand that offers plant-based, tasty, convenient and healthy food for everyone. Founded and launched in Ireland, it has delivered transformational growth in both Ireland and the UK, doubling its turnover each year and recently taking pole position as the UK's Fastest Growing Food & Beverage brand. Listen to Sam desecribe how his experience in his family’s food business has shaped Strong Roots’ success, on how everyone in the company needs to be a Sales person, and the importance of earning the respect of early adopters and being “found” or discovered by consumers.

Did you know that it's NOT a Coke or a Pepsi-owned brand that holds the title of the UKs best-selling functional drink, but an Irish brand called VITHIT! I really enjoyed talking to my old buddy and fellow-Irishman Gary Lavin, Founder of this super-charged, low calorie vitamin drinks range https://www.vithit.com. I’ve known Gary and followed VITHIT's progress for over 15 years, and
 what really intrigues me about this story is that most of this growth has been unlocked over the 5 past years. I’m also really inspired by Gary’s sheer honesty about mistakes he thinks he made and the doggedness that has been necessary to get the business to where it’s at today. Listen to Gary take us though the drivers of this recent transformational growth, how he recognised them, and what he’d do differently if he had to start over.

Who manages to create and build not 1 but 2 insurgent food brands that transform categories and what shoppers expect from their supermarket aisle? That's right, James Averdieck of The Coconut Collaberative and GU Chocolate Puds! Listen to James describe the drivers of the transformational growth he has experienced with both his businesses, from the importance of having people with Food Industry experience on his teams to being obsessed with product quality and great, quirky brands that resonate with consumers.

How do you grow a Chocolate brand to €70m in Sales without ever spending a penny on advertising? How do you get into EVERY SINGLE Sainsbury's store in the UK at launch...and account for over 35% of Chocolate sales at Wholefoods UK within 16 weeks?
 
 Listen to Ben Greensmith of Tony's Chocolonely tell us about THE most authentic and meaningful brand promise in Food and Bev - the serious attempt by Tony’s Chocolonely to change the Cocoa industry from the inside out, in order to eradicate childhood slavery and child labour in Cocoa producing countries.

How do you grow a brand to €120M in sales in only 2.5 years, launching 30 products, and revolutionising more than a few grocery categories along the way? And how do you achieve household penetration of 11 million French households, with NO advertising, NO field sales, and very little traditional negotiation with grocery buyers? When you consider that this is happening in France - one of the most inflexible, difficult to negotiate and costly European retail grocery markets - and is coming to the UK, USA, Germany, Italy and more markets imminently, every company supplying a food & bev product into retail grocery better be ready with a response!

L'entretien originale avec Nicolas Chabanne (episode 9) en francais. 
 C'est Qui Le Patron est une marque alimenaire multi-catégorielle qui était créée et est gérée par des consommateurs francais, afin de garantir des prix équitables aux agriculteurs et aux producteurs. Elle a été lancée il y a 3 ans sur l'un des marchés d'épiceries les plus traditionnels, les plus inflexibles, les plus difficiles à négocier et les plus coûteux d'Europe - d'après ma modeste expérience. Et pourtant, en seulement 2,5 ans, elle a révolutionné de nombreuses catégories d’épiceries en France, a généré un chiffre d’affaires de plus de 120 millions d’euros, dispose d’un portefeuille de plus de 30 produits et sont déjà achetés par 11 millions de ménages français. Et voici la chose: tout cela a été fait sans investissement dans la publicité traditionelle, sans force de vente et avec très peu de négociations traditionnelles avec les acheteurs de la Grande Distribution.
 Cet entretien souhaite explorer les facteurs à l'origine de cette croissance incroyable.
 L'interview est également disponible en anglais, voir episode 9 de Brand Growth Heroes

UGLY DRINKS was founded by best friends Hugh Thomas and Joe Benn in 2017. Coming from Vita Coco, they were concerned at the lack of healthy or unsweetened- options in the soda category for the average family. UGLY is a range of sparkling water that is flavoured but unsweetened, in brightly coloured, potentially iconic CAN, and is setting out to challenge the Ugly Truth behind Big Soda. 
 
 Ugly’s website positions it as “just a drink, no unobtainable lifestyles, no ridiculous promises”…and somewhat bravely (given the enormous competitors in this space) asks us to “Can the Other Cans”.
 
 Listen to Hugh Thomas discuss the brave decisions he and his co-founder have made around brand and category positioning, naming & flavouring, setting up in the USA and funding/invesment and its role in driving growth!

Giles Brook, renowned CEO, Entrepreneur and Investor has built up probably the most superb CV in the food and beverage industry, not to mention a supurbe portfolio of investments.
 Giles has been behind the growth of numerous insurgent brands – Innocent, Bear, Vita Coco, Pip and nut to name but a few. He is currently CEO of Vita Coco (for Europe Middle East and Africa) - which he launched over 10 years ago - and which is now turning over £40m in sales.
 Although he is the highest-ranked individual in The Grocer’s ‘Food & Drink Power List outside of global and multi-national CEOs, he is also nice, as he takes time out of the office to mentor and guide entrepreneurs. Here’s our interview earlier this month where we talk about what Giles looks for when investing in a company, whether looking for investment upfront or driving organic growth should be the thing, and how it can be really hard for founders working in the food industry
 

Pippa Murray founded Pip & Nut in 2015, out of a passion for running and a love of nut-butter, but not finding exactly what she wanted on the market. 
 The range is now sold in more than 5000 stores and is the fastest growing nut butter in the UK. Last year, the company was named Fasttrack 100s "one to watch" and The Evening Standard has named Pippa as one of London's most influential people! Here's our interview from the end of December, where we discuss BCorp certification, innovation as a growth-driver and managing people when you've never done it before.
 https://www.pipandnut.com/

 LISTEN AND RATE THIS EPISODE ON ITUNES HERE



Listen to this episode on Spotify HERE



and on STITCHER here 
 
 
 
If you’ve listened to the first few episodes of Series 2 of Brand Growth Heroes, you probably know that one of the themes we are exploring is the BRAVE decisions that food & Bev founders sometimes have to make.
 
 
 
Creating Tansformational Growth depends on getting a lot of things right. And in the food industry, there are a hell of a lot of things that can trip you up. But the thing is, they are mostly things that don’t need to trip you up if you know about them in advance, if someone explains to you how something works, or points something out to you that has often gone wrong for them in the past. 
 
 
 
  Something I’ve done throughout my career is to have collected a bunch of seasoned food entrepreneurs who I have built lovely relationships with, and whom I can call out of the blue to ask them who the best distributor in Germany is for Chilled, what margin I should expect to give to Spar in Switzerland, or whether sampling in Carrefour is worth the investment.
 
 
 
One such person is Barney Mauleverer. Barney cut his teeth in the food and drink industry during the first 5 years of early stage Innocent Drinks. In his last role as European Manager he headed up a new international strategy at Innocent to scope out new opportunities in Europe. In 2006, Barney left innocent to seek a more entrepreneurial route of his own and set up Fresh Marketing with his school and uni mate Alex Matheson. 
 
 
 
Fresh Marketing is an international business development consultancy and distributor. It was founded on spotting new innovations in food and drink that often emerge in the US and then head ‘East’. Product types include smoothies, premium crisps, cereal bars, flavoured popcorn and breakfast granola. Fresh Marketing has been involved in the overseas development and distribution of some of the UK’s fastest growing consumer food and drink brands including Innocent Drinks, Eat Natural, Burt’s Chips and more recently Candy Kittens, Deliciously Ella and a number of other high potential start-up brands. Fresh Marketing currently supplies over 40 international markets!
 
 
 
in 2013, Barney and Alex launched their own protein boosted breakfast brand FUEL10K.  FUEL10K is now stocked across all the major UK retailers and many convenience and food service customers. Self-funded from the start and with a brilliant team of 19 FUEL10K turns over £12m at retail sales value.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Listen to Barney share his 20+ years experience on how to approach international business development, how he felt saying No to 2200 stores in the USA, how long his upcoming deal in Australia took to close and much, much more…
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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Listen to this episode on Spotify HERE



We’re going to spend the next few episodes exploring how growing Food & Bev. businesses are coping with the current crisis, the kind of help they need, and some of the resources available to help them.



In this episode we’re talking to Jamie Mitchell, Founder All Together, an initiative offering CEO-CEO coaching, mentoring and business advice to companies affected by COVID 19.



Through All Together, Jamie has brought together a punchy panel of 60 well-known Chairpeople, CEOs and Investors, who are all offering their help on a voluntary basis. Advisors include Adam Balon and Jon Wright of Innocent Drinks, Xavier Vidal of Flying Tiger, Hema Patel and Jules Hydleman, to name but a few. See the almost complete list of advisors here



Jamie himself brings a wealth of experience to All Together, in his capacity as Non-Exec Chairman of Rare Restaurants and Keatz, and as Ex CEO of Tom Dixon, Daylesford Organic and Innocent Smoothies UK.



Listen to Jamie on why he started All Together and who and how they can help; and his thoughts on the 3 stages your company should plan for during the crisis.



alltogether.company
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes & SHARE it on your social media!
 
 
 
S2EP6 Timestamps to follow.

In this episode, we're talking to Tom Szaky, the 38 year old founder of Terra Cycle, the world’s leading company in the collection and reuse of the non-recyclable stuff we all throw away every day. Think turning Colgate toothpaste tubes into school playgrounds, or enabling P&G to offer money off coupons to consumers in return for their dirty pampers, which are then recycled into new materials.

You may have read that Terra Cycle has just launched a new company called LOOP, which aims to tackle packaging waste at its root cause and could potentially see us buying all of our favourite consumer packaged goods in branded durable and reusable containers, rather than the staple single-use packaging they are mostly in now.  

For those of us who work with Consumer Packaged Goods,  Loop is so far reaching that if it works, it will change everything from how you design, package and sell your products, all the way through to what your Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Operations and P&L will look like.

In this episode of Brand Growth Heroes, Tom goes into depth on how Loop offers CPG brands the opportunity to shift from single use disposable packaging forms to durable reusable forms, and what the benefits are for you as a brand, over and above the obvious and most important benefit of the reduction of your brand’s impact on the environment.

LISTEN AND RATE THIS EPISODE ON ITUNES HERE

Listen to this episode on Spotify HERE

If you’ve listened to the first few episodes of Series 2 of Brand Growth Heroes, you probably know that one of the themes we are exploring is the BRAVE decisions that food & Bev founders sometimes have to make.

In this episode we’re talking to Paul Brown, CEO and Founder of BOL Foods, a fast growing chilled food brand that offers plant-based Dinner boxes, Veg Pots, Salad Jars and Soups to busy foodies, and is available in most retailers nationally across the UK.

***Covid 19 addition: Paul and I caught up again last week to record an update in which Paul takes us through how he and the team are getting through the Covid 19 crisis***

Paul launched BOL after 14 years at Innocent drinks, where he gained invaluable experience across roles from Field Sales, to Sales Controller, and finally as General Manager of Innocent Food in 2014.

He launched BOL in 2015…and what’s particularly fascinating about this story is the brave decision Paul made – for ethical reasons – that led to BOL becoming the first FMCG food brand IN THE WORLD to drop all meat, fish and dairy from their products …to become 100% plant based.

Listen to our interview earlier this month where Paul tells us about the learnings at innocent that have helped to drive growth at BOL, his super- brave decision to pivot his business model to 100% plant-based, and his thoughts and plans around  plastic packaging….

https://www.bolfoods.com

https://www.instagram.com/bolfoods/ : @bolfoods

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes & SHARE it on your social media!

S2EP4 Timestamps:

[00:28] – Introducing, Paul Brown, CEO and Founder of BOL foods; a fast growing chilled food brand offering 100% plant based options to busy foodies.  

[01:55] – Introduction to BOL; what do they make and where can we find their products?

[02:33] – Why did Paul start the company back in 2015? 

[03:23] – BOL is on a mission to inspire the world to eat more plants. Why is that and how has BOL’s mission evolved since its inception?

[04:19] – BOL has big ambitions and fast growth. How many people are there in the offices at BOL?

[05:04] – Paul has managing experience he brings with him after 14 years at Innocent. What else has he learned that he has been able to use while setting up BOL and driving growth?

[07:30] – The food industry is really hard, particularly the chilled foods sector. What are the things that stick out to Paul as particularly difficult to manage as a chilled supplier to a grocery retailer, that he was able to overcome more quickly because of his experience at Innocent?

[10:42] – What kind of roles are absolutely critical to have on the team to make a company like BOL successful? The business is split into five key functions; finance team, operations team, commercial teams, brand marketing team, and people team.

[13:58] – At what point in BOL’s trajectory did they decide to add more people? How do you make the leap from 5 to 20 people? 

[16:08] – Paul explains how everybody in the company interviews the new people coming in.

[17:57] – One of the big draws for people interviewing for food companies is the free products that always find themselves around the office. Are the fridges in the offices at BOL filled with their products?

[20:15] – Paul talks about product innovation.

[21:27] – Initially BOL had meat, fish and dairy as part of their range. How did they make the brave decision to pivot to focus entirely on plant based ranges?

[24:46] – We often talk about a company’s mission coming from a place of authenticity. Paul’s mission came about because he believes there is a real need rather than because he thinks it is where the market is going.

[26:31] – Paul explains why phasing out the meat, fish and dairy slowly to reduce the risk didn’t feel right. He also talks about bringing up his kids with this new mindset about how they look at food.

[29:31] – What it means to be a really authentic mission driven company. Paul talks about his relationship with investors and shareholders.

[33:07] – BOL recently made the decision to launch their dinner boxes in 95% plant based packaging and are aiming for a 100%. How do they reconcile the plastic packaging in their business?

[36:21] – Paul explains how the lack of better options means they can’t take the same approach to the plastic packaging as they did with plant based food products and simply pivot away from it. What approach are they taking?

[38:14] – Finally, what is next for BOL? Paul talks big growth ambitions, increasing the range, and international ambitions.

***Covid 19 addition: Paul and I caught up again last week to record an update in which Paul takes us through how he and the team are getting through the Covid 19 crisis***

We’re going to spend the next few episodes exploring how growing Food & Bev. businesses are coping with the current crisis, the kind of help they need, and some of the resources available to help them. 

In this episode we’re talking to Jason Gibb, one of the co-founders of Bread & Jam. Once an annual business festival for Food & Beverage entrepreneurs, now Bread & Jam is helping several hundred companies a week, joining them from as far away as Australia!

From evening workshops to morning socials, entrepreneurs can sign up for free and paid events that will build key skills, their industry network and their confidence.

Bread & Jam was borne from the success of Jason’s online community, The FoodHub, which is the biggest community of food & drink entrepreneurs in Europe 

Jason also has his own plant-based food start-up, called Unruly Burger https://www.eatunruly.com/

Listen to Jason on why he started Bread & Jam, and how it works:

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes & SHARE it on your social media!

S2EP8 Timestamps to follow.

In Episode 5of Series 1, we spoke to Sam Dennigan, founder of insurgent frozen brand STRONG ROOTS, which offers tasty plant-based food designed for busy lives.

Sam promised to come back on the show and update us on how their impending launch in the USA went…which he does in this episode.

Shortly after we recorded our update, Covid 19 hit, so we recorded a further section on how the current crisis has effected the Strong Roots business.

An episode not to be missed!

strongroots.com 

Instagram: Strong Roots Irl Strong Roots UK Strong Roots USA

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes & SHARE it on your social media!

S2EP9 Timestamps to follow.

Buymie was conceived when Founder Devan Hughes learned that the £9bn online retail grocery industry in UK & Irl, was loosing over £300M per year…and he reckoned it was therefore ripe for disruption.

Buymie is a mobile-first, on-demand grocery delivery platform enabling consumers to order any grocery or household item from local stores using their mobile device, and get them delivered in as little as 1 hour.

The Buymie platform connect customers, via the app, to a fully vetted and trained crowd sourced personal shopper network.

Listen to Devan share the inside track on the super-charged growth that Buymie has seen over the past 18 months, how they’ve just received £2.2M in funding, and how they are now the online delivery platform for Lidl Ireland!

 An episode not to be missed!

Buymie.eu

Devan is the CEO and Co-Founder of Same day grocery e-commerce platform Buymie. Devan holds a degree in Finance from the National College of Ireland, and has worked in the start-up sector for most of his career. A guest lecturer in some of Europe’s best Business Schools, Devan is recognised as one of Europe’s foremost thought leaders in the fields of grocery e-commerce, platform economics and architecture.

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes & SHARE it on your social media!

S2EP10 Timestamps to follow.

It’s tough times out there for many brands. Even for the lucky ones who are seeing an increase in sales due to the current situation, future plans are up in the air and investment in growth is on pause, with so much depending on how things pan out over the next few months.

We wanted to find out what’s happening in the world of investment & funding for brands with big growth plans: have most put their investment journeys on hold? What should you do if you were planning to raise money this year? 

In this episode we’re talking to Yasha Estraikh, who’s an Associate Partner at Piper, the investment partner of choice for brands such as Propercorn, Mindful Chef and many more you’ll recognise. Yasha is in charge of Brand and Customer Research and Insight, and he helps brands keep their customer at the centre of everything they do.

I learnt SO much from this hour with Yasha – not only that most sources of investment are focusing on their current portfolios at the moment, but tons about how funding and investment for growing brands works in general. If you have ever really wanted to understand how it all works, you need to listen to this!

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes & SHARE it on your social media!

S2EP11 Timestamps to follow.

How many of us eat chocolate or other cocoa-based products without realising – and this is deadly serious – that we could be unwittingly funding child labour and even child slavery in West Africa?

Almost a year ago, we interviewed Ben Greensmith, the UK country manager of Tony’s Chocolonely, and we heard how this amazing company is trying to change the cocoa industry and eradicate child labour and childhood slavery. If you’d like to listen to this episode, look for Series 1 Episode 8 (SE1Ep8) on your podcast player. 

A month or so ago, I learned that the level of child labour in West African cocoa farms had actually increased over the past 10 years, which just really shocked and saddened me.

In this special catch-up episode, I asked Ben to bring us up to speed with the situation in West Africa, as well as share with us how Tony’s Chocolonely is doing in the U.K. market since its launch.

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes or Spotify

 & SHARE it on your social media

S2EP12 Timestamps to follow.

Mark Mulhern is a Brand Performance Coach with a spectacular CV in brand advertising and through-the-line Marketing investment. He’s worked agency-side for the past 20+ years managing advertising accounts worth £100M of pounds and dollars, for clients such as Mars, Unilever, McDonalds, Amazon, Virgin and Sainsbury’s.

If you’ve listened to the first few episodes of Series 1 of Brand Growth Heroes, you’ll know that one of the New 4Ps of Transformational Growth is PROCESS – how insurgent brands define and attack challenges differently to incumbent or less successful brands. 

One of these challenges is managing the transition of how you approach your MARKETING INVESTMENT as a start-up, vs. how you think about it and deliver it as an emerging brand with a serious growth trajectory. 

If you’ve been pootering along nicely with sampling and social media, but recognise that the time has come to get your head around what a more strategic approach looks like, then this episode is for you.

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes or Spotify

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The case study in Category transformation that is on everyone’s lips right now is Oatly.

But did you know that Oatly has been around for 30 years in the Dairy Alternatives Category?

It’s only really in the past 5 years that something has changed massively, at least in the UK market.

In 2016, Oatly’s UK revenue was around £6M, but this year they are looking at hitting around £75M!

If you want to know how they did this, then you’re in luck! We spoke to Ishen Paran, UK Country Manager who told us about the 5 levers that he and the Oatly UK team have pulled to drive this incredible growth…

#oatmilk #oatly #transformationalgrowth #brandgrowthheroes #plantbased

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes or Spotify

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Across the Western world, the Carbonated Soft Drinks category is experiencing real transformation… thanks to the sugar backlash, the resulting sugar tax and the fight against plastic.

I recently heard that the majority of fizzy soft drinks sold in the supermarkets now contain no or low amounts of added sugar, which really surprised me. For a category that has been built on the white stuff for over 100 years, that’s a pretty big change.

It goes without saying that it has been a difficult few years for some of the big global soft drink brands, but the other side of that coin is that there are plenty of exciting emerging brands taking advantage of the move towards Healthier and Natural. They and creating new category sub segments some real #transformational growth. Think real fruit sodas, no added sugar seltzers, and even the more niche Kombuchas, kefir waters, sparkling coconut waters….

If you live in the UK, you probably recognise the very cool British soft drinks brand Dalston’s soda, whose mission is to put real ingredients back at the heart of soft drinks.

I think their range of highly distinctive, brightly coloured metallic cans with the big standout D for Dalstons on the front is a future brand icon – just the right mix of cool yet accessible to the mass market.  Together with great drinks made with real fruit, low sugar, local ingredients and even distilled botanicals for serious amount of great flavour, Dalston’s is one to watch.

I spoke to Dan Broughton, CEO and Co-Founder to find out how he and his team is setting the brand up for success.

If you enjoy this episode, it would be really helpful if you REVIEW it on iTunes or Spotify

& SHARE it on your social media

So here’s a question for you:

Which grocery category of non-edible products do you shop making increasingly careful choices around the products’ ingredients, choosing your favourites based on something very akin to flavours, looking for additive free or organic options, and even buying different versions of the product to cater for different members of the household?

For me, there are quite a few parallels between how we shop Food & Beverage grocery categories, and how we shop the Personal Care categories.  After all, the products in Personal  Care are about how we take care of, nourish and draw experience from our bodies from the outside-in, whereas we buy Food and Beverage products to solve these needs from the inside-out.

Another really interesting parallel is that like Food and Bev. start-ups, skin and hair care brands also increasingly try to develop their products from natural kitchen-cupboard ingredients and have a brand purpose that is centred on being kind to nature. Another striking similarity is that these businesses often start at the kitchen table, getting proof of concept at farmers markets, before moving into retail.

What I find interesting about the Personal Care category is that it remains majorly dominated by the large global brands that our grandmothers and mothers would recognise: Head&Shoulders, Radox, Palmolive, Dove… or slightly more recently, all the “famous hairdresser” hair care brands that have launched since I was in my 20s.

And although there has been a real change on the fringes of the category for years,  in the Whole Foods and the  Holland& Barretts, why aren’t more of the local, natural, purpose-led brands not stealing share from big brands in the supermarkets?

I have decided to pepper this series with the odd interview with founders of insurgent brands across various Personal Care categories, to see if we can learn from their experiences in a different category, in a different stage of the unavoidable 21st century category overhaul we are seeing across the board.

I recently came across an inspiring emerging brand in Personal Care that started out on the kitchen table 12 years ago, but now has national listings across all the major grocery retailers and drugstore chains in the UK , has 30 employees and is currently seeing at at least £4M in market sales.

The Little Soap Company is a purpose driven, vegan, cruelty free, ethically produced, free-from brand with a range of soaps, solid shampoo and shaving bars that use organic ingredients that you’d easily recognise.  It was the first-  and is still the only – “free from” range on the supermarket shelves, and has just started what could be a revolution for the category – a range of solid shampoos and washes, to avoid packaging in plastic containers.

 We also discuss whether it’s useful to talk about what it’s like being a female founder.

To start to start your journey in understanding how emerging brands can transform the Personal Care category, and what we can learn from their experience, LISTEN to our interview with award winning and inspirational Founder/CEO Emma Heathcote-James.

Hear how Emma’s vision is “to make pure soap the norm not the niche” and how as the first – and often only– “free from” range on the supermarket shelves, The Little Soap Company is at the forefront of some real category transformation. 

www.thelittlesoapcompany.co.uk

Instagram: little_soap_co; eco_warrior_soap 

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