S2: The power of retail theater, with Bill Collison, founder of Bill's

Conversations of Inspiration

Holly Tucker MBE

Education, Society & Culture, Entrepreneurship, Self-improvement, Business, Personal Journals

5.0 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 21 January 2019

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This week, Holly meets Bill Collison, the founder of Bill’s restaurants. In this episode, Bill shares his journey from the very early days as a barrow boy all the way to taking on investment to grow the business into what it is today.

As a Romany gypsy, Bill grew up planting and foraging, which helped fuel his love for fresh, seasonal produce. It was this love of fruit and vegetables which led Bill to work for a brief time as a chef, before going back to work for his dad. Together, they started selling local, seasonal produce in a small shop. With instinctive creativity, and an inherent eye for design, the shop become hugely successful. With a growing array of homemade pies and soups alongside his fruit and veg, Bill’s Saturday girl (and now wife!) convinced him to think bigger and open a cafe. The first Bills in Lewes went from strength to strength and five years later a second site opened in Brighton which found equal success. Bill’s is now a family of over 80 restaurants!

Crediting its success to the team (or as he describes them, family) who shared the same vision, Bill shares his advice for small businesses starting out in the food industry today. As well as his view on the future of the high street (and how to survive).

Enjoying listening to these unfiltered chats? It's worth following Holly Tucker MBE and Holly & Co on Instagram, and subscribing to our weekly newsletter on our website, where Holly downloads her thoughts, and exclusively shares small business finds and topical, 'ungoogleable' business advice.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm Holly Tucker and welcome to my podcast Conversations of Inspiration
0:06.5	founder of Not on the High Street and Holly and Co. I'm the UK Ambassador of Creative Small Businesses.
0:13.7	I believe that having a business doing what you love is the key to a happy, fulfilled life,
0:20.3	and my dream is to help everyone start theirs.
0:24.0	I'm here to offer advice, inspiration, wisdom and encouragement,
0:29.0	and in my view, the greatest way to do this is by sharing stories.
0:33.6	So I've reached out to all my favorite small businesses,
0:37.0	acclaimed entrepreneurs, and those who just simply inspire me
0:41.8	and ask them to share theirs. With thanks to our sponsor Nat West
0:46.3	who have helped bring this free podcast to life. Here are my conversations of
0:51.6	inspiration.
0:53.0	Bower head and let your islands close on down.
0:57.0	In this week's conversation of inspiration,
1:00.0	I'm speaking to Bill Collison, founder of Bill's restaurants. Born in Bredden Lewis in
1:06.2	East Sussex, Bill started work by growing and harvesting fruit and veg with his family. One day he received an offer of a small shed by his father to make of it what he wished.
1:18.8	So he started selling the families and local farmers fruit and veg which soon turned into a
1:25.9	greengrocer's shop but not any greengrocers the most beautiful green
1:31.0	grosses in town. When the flood hit Lewis, Bill was forced to
1:35.5	reassess his plans and on the advice of his sister-in-law he decided to start a
1:40.6	cafe as well, selling edible creations from all of his produce.
1:45.2	The food was seasonal, inspirational and ahead of its time. Bill put fruit on the pizzas,
1:52.0	added roots and sprouts onto salads and created extraordinary show-stopping cakes,
	...

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