The Places We'll Go Marketing Show

In this episode, Richard talks about his hopes for the future of Iceland Foods, the importance of sustainability and how his career journey led him to become Managing Director of Iceland Foods.   Who is Richard Walker?   Richard is Managing Director at Iceland Foods, the company established by his mother and father in 1970.  Iceland Foods has mostly recently become known for driving forward the sustainability agenda for UK and global retailers – successfully removing palm oil from all our food and pledging to remove 13,000 tons of plastic from our own-brand products by 2023.   He is a proud Trustee of the ‘Iceland Foods Charitable Foundation’, and the conservation groups ‘Fauna & Flora International’ and ‘Surfers Against Sewage’. Richard also sits on DEFRA’s ‘Council for Sustainable Business’ and Greenpeace’s ‘Ocean Advisory Board’. In 2019 he was selected as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.   Richard worked full-time as a shelf-stacker and cashier in London for a year, before becoming a store manager and then moving to Iceland’s head office at Deeside, Flintshire, in 2013. After various head office roles, he became Managing Director of The Food Warehouse, Iceland’s sister chain now with over 130 larger format stores, in 2015.  He was promoted to his current role as Managing Director of the Iceland Foods Group in August 2018, overseeing almost 1,000 stores, 25,000 staff and 5 million customers per week.  Outside family and business, Richard's greatest passions are trail running, skiing, surfing and climbing all over the world.

In this episode Meghan talks about how she is preparing for her transition into her new role as Chief Customer Officer at Asda, what she has learnt about herself during the pandemic and how her setbacks allowed her to develop.   Who is Meghan Farren?   While Megan brings a wealth of experience in strategy, brand management and communications, she is most well-known for building talented, high performing teams and empowering them to deliver bold, courageous work. Before her appointment as CMO at KFC UK & Ireland, Meg held various leadership roles in insight, innovation and communications.   Prior to her ten years at KFC, Meg had a track record of driving growth and business change across a broad range of consumer businesses. She began her career at JPMorganChase, then spent five years in strategy consulting across various retail and FMCG sectors, followed by roles in sales, category management and brand marketing at Gu Puds.   She is now taking over as Chief Customer Officer for Asda where she will lead the development and strategy of Asda’s total customer proposition, marketing and management of its brands.

Helen Tupper is the co-founder and CEO of Amazing If, a company with an ambition to make careers better for everyone. Together with her business partner Sarah Ellis, she is the author of The Sunday Times number one bestseller The Squiggly Career (Penguin) and host of the Squiggly Careers podcast. In January 2021 they recorded their TEDx talk Why squiggly careers are better for everyone at Abbey Road Studios in London. In this episode of The Places We'll Go Marketing Show Helen, talks about how Amazing If has developed from a small side hustle to a completely new way of transforming the world of work, advice she would give those that are too scared to start their own side hustle and how sticking to her values has led her to where she is today. 

After two and a half decades of being Group CEO at one of the largest Creative Agencies in the UK, AMV BBDO, Dame Cilla Snowball CBE took a step back to focus on her Grandmother duties with her new Grandson, and explore different opportunities in Science and Property. In this episode, Cilla reflects on her incredible career journey and shares how she became so successful. Cilla continuously gives credit to the opportunities that her peers gave her, despite her incredible talent and passion for the industry, she is a truly humble and inspirational leader that sees the importance of "collaborating like scientists".  Cilla also spoke about the reality of being CEO of such a large company and the pressures that come with it, especially while balancing becoming a new mother. She mentions the need to always be plausibly optimistic to support and motivate your employees, as well as, the need to admit mistakes as a leader. But what is clearer than anything is Cilla's values, her family comes before everything... Sponsored by School of Marketing. Delivering digital and data-led marketing apprenticeships and training. 

In this episode, Mark talks about the importance of diversity and inclusion, the unavoidability of hard work if you want a successful career and the balance between data and creativity. Key Takeaways Hard work is unavoidable Importance of diversity and inclusion in the workplace Finding a balance between data and creativity You can't cruise through life with a sense of entitlement Who is Mark Read? Mark was appointed CEO of WPP in 2018. Since joining WPP in 1989, he has held multiple leadership positions across the company including Head of Strategy and then CEO of WPP Digital where he was responsible for WPP’s first moves into technology. In 2015, he became Global CEO of Wunderman, which he transformed into one of the world’s leading creative, data and technology agencies. Earlier in his career, he co-founded internet start-up WebRewards and specialised in media and marketing as a principal at consultancy Booz Allen Hamilton. Mark was voted the industry’s Most Influential Person of 2019 in Econsultancy’s Top 100 Digital Agencies report and was recognised as a HERoes Champion of Women in Business in 2018, 2019 and 2020.

The power of trust became incredibly clear in this episode of The Places We'll Go Marketing show with Dan Sherwood, the Marketing Director at Santander. Whether it be in terms of stakeholder management, campaign creation, relationship building and even trusting that you are enough physically, the power of forming relationships that are built on trust is key to building a successful career and this has been proven through Dan's journey.    Dan shared his journey of recognising that he is enough and trusting his intuition, we took a dive into the reality of building Santander's campaign and partnership with Ant and Dec, and he shared his thoughts on giving everyone a second chance.   Topics:   Get comfortable with making yourself known  Battling imposter syndrome with work and personal insecurities   Trusting your instinct  Building meaningful relationships  Reverting to data  The power of trust  Second chances  Stakeholder management   Sponsored by School of Marketing. Delivering digital and data led marketing apprenticeships and training programmes.

Sophie Neary, the Group Director at Meta, joined us for an incredibly inspiring episode in which her "sunniness", energy and excitement for life was clear. She has been on a journey of accepting that you can't always be perfect but you can always find the beauty in where you are in the moment, without worrying about the future. She is a true activist that encourages others to find the bravery inside of them to also fight for what they believe in. Sophie powerfully ended this episode on the note of "never self reject". Sponsored by School of Marketing. Delivering digital and data-led marketing apprenticeships and training.

In this episode we were joined by an incredibly humble marketing leader, Gary Booker, the Chief Marketing and Innovation Officer at Rentokil Initial. Gary's calm, passionate personality shined throughout the whole episode as we spoke about the importance of taking the route that allows you to focus on learning, staying calm in a crisis and putting people first no matter what. He has a passion for understating the psychology of what makes people tick and utilises this knowledge throughout all his marketing efforts.  Sponsored by School of Marketing. Delivering digital and data-led marketing apprenticeships and training. 

This was an incredibly inspirational episode with Annabel Venner, Chair of The Marketing Society Fellows, who has had a whirlwind of a career with over 20 years of FTSE 100 and Blue Chip experience across finance, FMCG, healthcare and ecommerce sectors, and an outstanding record of driving business growth and profitability. In this episode we get to see Annabel's fierce, strong and spirited character that has got her through some incredibly heart-breaking times, and is part of what makes her an amazing mother to her two boys, and a respected leader in our industry. We also touch on the power of connections, why she is passionate about mentoring, and why her 18 year-old self wouldn't recognise her now... Sponsored by School of Marketing. Delivering digital and data-led marketing apprenticeships and training. 

In our 100th episode, Byron Sharp, one of the most influential marketers in our industry and renowned Professor and Director Ehrenberg-Bass Institute, joined us on The Places We'll Go Show. From the reality of how brands grow, to cocaine and prostitutes this episode was an absolute whirlwind. Listen now to hear about Byron's passion for discovery and the importance of it, how he became the leader he is today and the power of having an open mind.  Sponsored by School of Marketing. Delivering digital and data-led marketing apprenticeships and training.