BIO
After graduating with a business degree and successfully finishing a graduate trainee programme, I started my career looking after the marketing needs of over 3,000 types of cylindrical roller bearings at SKF in Germany. Whilst this was of course not the most exciting product range for a young and energetic marketer, it gave me great insight into a truly global organisation. It also awakened my desire to become more international as a person.
The European labour market had just opened up, and anyone could work pretty much anywhere. So, after a few years of bearings and lubricants, I moved to London, where my first few years saw me work in hospitality telesales (toughest job ever!) and then advising European brands on advertising and media strategy in Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E.. I even studied Arabic for a while to impress the boss 
.
I then worked for over 10 years for a brilliant and dynamic American company called Gemstar, which, after buying TV Guide, became Gemstar TV Guide, later Rovi and is now trading under the Tivo brand. During those early years – you still had to log on to the internet via Compuserve dial-up and the first mobile phones with pull-out antennas were all the rage – I launched the video recording system ShowView in Russia and other Eastern European countries and ran advertising campaigns all across Europe, before focusing on the development and launch of the first ever Electronic Programme Guides (truly pioneering stuff) across Europe. I even patented some ideas.
After 2005 I ran Marketing and Sales for two of the company’s product divisions in Luxembourg before jumping ship to branch out, develop my own ideas and to enter the exciting world of freelance consulting and irregular income.
Highlights of those years include running a charity telephone helpline, re-branding and creating sales and marketing strategy for an artisan Kombucha tea company, developing a digital strategy for a luxury property business in London, creating a marketing strategy for an underwear company, evaluating the performance of sales teams for an American pharmaceutical company and the German sales division of a well-known global credit card company.
I also worked with a number of exciting start-ups, developing investment pitches, explainer videos, marketing and revenue plans, pitching for investment as well as giving tv and radio interviews about the projects.
Easily my proudest moment, however, is the creation of a very effective charity in Ethiopia that I have been running with friends since 2004. Over the years we have supported over 230 orphans and street children with their education. 19 of those inspiring young people are now doctors working in hospitals. Many have achieved international scholarships (for example at NYU) and 60+ are working as engineers on exciting projects in Ethiopia. I have bought mattresses and pillows on street markets, developed meal plans for 60 students who live in our home, lobbied at Rotary events, embassies and at the House of Lords, interviewed hundreds of candidates for scholarships, raised a huge amount of donations, ran the charity’s marketing, organised and hosted black tie fundraisers and created a lasting legacy in one of the poorest countries in the world.
In 2019, just as the UK was preparing to close the borders it had so successfully opened back in the early 90s, I decided to relocate to the beautiful Island of Mallorca. This is a truly wonderful place where (a bit like in London in the early 90s) many people from international backgrounds live, work and explore business opportunities. Immediately I felt that I fit in very well.
So here I am offering my services to individuals or companies who are looking for some input into communicating their market position.
If your presentation needs to be reviewed from a new perspective, if your investment pitch needs tuning, if your new brochure needs a review, proofreading, or translation, get in touch.
If your sales are stagnant and / or if your marketing efforts don’t create the expected outcomes, get in touch too.