SPEAKING OUT - Richard Reed

Co-founder, "Innocent" Smoothies

Richard Reed stands slightly sheepish in a crumpled T-shirt and jeans, his tousled hair belying a successful business brain.

Just five years ago he and a friend invested £500 in mixing smoothies to sell at a weekend music festival. Above the stall a sign said, "Should we give up our jobs to make these smoothies?" Punters voted by casting their empty bottles into one of two dustbins. The "Yes" bin won and now Innocent has a £37 million turnover. Clearly a success, but what could Reed usefully tell the assembled company at the Marketing Society annual conference? Well, he kept it simple.

His five rules included "keep the main thing, the main thing" and "take care of the details". He summed up his philosophy of continuous learning with the phrase "be porous" - suck in all the information you can. He was particularly keen to make best use of his website, which attracts practical and constructive suggestions from consumers. Perhaps the most compelling of his arguments were around the concept of Corporate Social Responsibility. While "it's no good if a tobacco company decides to invest in a children's playground", Innocent gives 10% of its profits to the countries which grow the fruit they use in their smoothies.

Reed came across well, but he could do with a little help on his speaking style. He tended to speak far too quickly at times and swallow his words, making him hard to understand. He needs to eliminate some of the buzzy jargon he favours. I lost count of how many times he said a particular initiative "had traction". But overall, his rough and ready approach certainly struck a chord with the audience.

Key Lesson: telling it like it is always the best policy even if your delivery style is rough round the edges.

Key moment: When Innocent joked on its bottles that the ingredients included 'plump nuns', Trading Standards told them to remove this or include plump nuns in the recipe!

Silver tongue or foot in mouth? Silver Tongue

This article was written by Khalid Aziz for and features in Management Today Magazine.
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