Grenade CEO Exposes The Brutal Truth About UK Taxes & Building a Billion-Dollar Company | Al Barratt

Disruptors

Rob Moore

Careers, How To, Business, Self-improvement, Society & Culture, Marketing, Investing, Education, Entrepreneurship

4.8 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 5 April 2026

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Grenade co-founder Al Barratt reveals the raw, unfiltered journey of disrupting the global confectionery industry with nothing but a £500 startup loan and a refusal to fail. Al breaks down the high-stakes world of private equity, the gut-wrenching personal sacrifices of choosing a business over a marriage, and the tactical genius behind out-selling legendary brands like Mars and Cadbury from the back of petrol stations. Whether he’s discussing the scams of the fitness industry, the brutal truth about the UK tax system, or the adrenaline of a £200 million deal, Al provides a masterclass in staying simple, staying gritty, and knowing exactly when to cash your chips. BEST MOMENTS "The reward for good work is more work... I just don't need to work behind a desk" "I think if you don't do it, you've already failed. You've just got to fail quickly, take the learnings from it, and go again" "I never dream that we’d basically overtake Cadbury... but then when we got into the top 20 of confectionery. We overtook Twix and stuff. I had no idea how many Twixes were selling, but I was surprised we were selling more." Exclusive community & resources: For more EXCLUSIVE & unfiltered content to make, manage & multiply more money, join our private online education platform: Money.School →⁠ ⁠⁠https://money.school⁠ And if you’d like to meet 7 & 8 figure entrepreneurs, & scale to 6, 7 or 8 figures in your business or personal income, join us at our in-person Money Maker Summit Event (including EXCLUSIVE millionaire guests/masterminds sessions) →⁠ ⁠⁠https://robmoore.live/mms⁠ 🔗 CONNECT WITH ROB 📸 Facebook: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/robmooreprogressive/?locale=en_GB⁠ 📸 Instagram:⁠ ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/robmooreprogressive/⁠ 👨‍💻 Linkedin:⁠ ⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/robmoore1979?originalSubdomain=uk⁠ 🌍 Website: ⁠https://robmoore.com/⁠ 🎙 A NOTE FOR THE #DISRUPTORS: The world is on the edge of a revolution. Wealth, power & information are being disrupted. Mainstream media is dying. Your freedom is being challenged. Your money is being debased. #Disruptors & Rob Moore asks the questions others dare not to ask. Disruptive & diverse guests speak out on topical world issues & their areas of success & influence. As the world has changed, Disruptors has evolved to diverse global movers, shakers & change makers who stand out & speak up. Want to start your own podcast? Get in touch - Disruptive Media. ⁠⁠https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/⁠ If you don’t risk anything, you risk everything.

Transcript

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0:00.0	As of last year, it was just shy of a billion dollars.
0:02.1	How much tax did you pay?
0:03.4	You had to go there, didn't you? Yeah, so we paid......aughes. Alan Barrett, the CEO of Grenade. One of the UK's fastest growing brands. We're disrupting chocolate, and we just need to stop punishing people for taking risks. Do they even want to support entrepreneurship? Why aren't they? This just has to change. What's your biggest fuck up? There's been a lot of personal sacrifice over the years.
0:23.5	And I had to choose them but remember what. important entrepreneurship. Why aren't they? This just has to change. What's your biggest fuck up?
0:24.8	There's been a lot of personal sacrifice over the years and I had to choose them between my wife or my business and I kind of chose what is the biggest scam in the fitness and the
0:29.2	industry you think? The biggest scam.
0:35.7	Al, are you allowed to disclose how much you sold grenade for?
0:39.1	Yes, yeah.
0:39.9	So we sold it in various increments over the years,
0:44.2	we've done two rounds of private equity, two rounds of trade.
0:47.3	So I've done four grenade deals in total,
0:49.7	starting off with 35 million in 2014 to Grove Point Capital,
0:58.5	then 72 million in 2017 to Lion Capital.
1:02.5	And each of these events I kind of cash shares, rolled shares and kind of kept going.
1:05.3	In some instances, I hit targets and earned shares back.
1:29.1	But then we did the most lucrative then for me in terms of the shares at at the time. Uh, we did 20, 21 for 200 million. And that was to Mondalese, who have only ever bought two businesses in the UK, Grenade and Cadbury. Um, that was 2021. And then 2024, we'd taken the business to 600 and 11 million at that point. And then that was it.
1:34.4	Then I was kind of out of shares. And then they said, would you like to stay? I said, no.
1:43.1	The reward for good work is more work, basically. So I said, no, I just don't need to work to work beyond a desk. But actually, Mondalese have been, and actually are the best partners we could ever have.
1:50.9	And 300 billion market cap, they own Philadelphia and Belvita and Cadbury and Oreo and whatever so, been really helpful. They moved our offices
2:04.0	then from Solihull where at the time we moved up to Bourneville to go into Cadbury HQ. And then we
2:11.0	came up, we actually spent a year. I stepped down as CEO last year after my earn out, but we came up
2:16.1	with a year figuring out, before the earn
	...

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