Richard Reed

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Richard Reed - Conference and keynote speaker, business

Topics:

Business
Sustainability

RICHARD REED is the co-founder of Innocent Drinks, the UK's fastest growing food and drinks company and the no.1 smoothie brand in the UK. Richard is a fabulous keynote speaker for events geared around business, leadership and CSR (corporate social responsibility).

The Innocent Story

The Innocent story shows that with a non-corporate attitude, a sincere commitment to the cause and creative thinking it is possible to create a fast growing, profitable company that acts responsibly.

In 2006 Innocent Drinks employs 89 people, and has its little tasty drinks selling in over 6,000 outlets. The innocent range has expanded to include: special smoothies for children, big one litre cartons for families at home, juicy waters for a more refreshing natural drink and thickies for a yoghurt and fruit blend. The drinks regularly win industry awards, including Best Soft Drink in the UK.

Serial Entrepeneur

Innocent is not Richard's first enterprise. In fact, Richard's entrepreneurial career started earlier than most, when he began washing windows for his neighbors at the age of 8. Following a brief spell of selling Smurf stickers at junior school (until his teachers caught him), Richard retired from the coalface of self-employment, aged 12. However, a summer job picking up dog biscuits in a pet food factory soon reminded Richard of the joys of working for himself, and led him to set up a summer gardening business called Two Men Went to Mow, employing his school friends.

After graduating from Cambridge University and working in advertising for four years, Richard and his two college friends Jon and Adam, decided to set up a lovely fresh fruit juice company. After six months of developing recipes in their kitchen, they boys wanted to test their drinks with a wider audience. To do so, they bought £500 of fruit, turned it into smoothies and sold them from a stall at a music festival. They put up a sign that said, 'Should we give up our jobs to make these smoothies', and put out a big bin that said NO and one that said YES. Fortunately, at the end of the weekend, the YES bin was full so they went in the next day and resigned.