life after innocent

We reckon innocent is a great place to grow a career, so we hope whoever walks through our doors on their first day will stick around for a while. Saying that, some people do decide to leave eventually (there are only so many free smoothies one person can take home before space becomes an issue). To list all those people and all the great things they’ve done would take quite a while, so we’ve hand-picked a few good apples to give you an idea of what can happen next.

Mike Stevens and Dan Shrimpton founders at Peppersmith

After racking up an impressive combined 14 years at innocent, this duo flew the nest to set up a natural confectionary company. Now their mints and gums are available all over the country.

Jess Swinfen founder at Duppy Share

Jess joined innocent as employee number 17 back in 2002. Then she became employee number 1 at Duppy Share in 2013. Cheers to that.

Henk Jan Beltman and Ben Greensmith bigwigs at Tony’s Chocolonely

From smoothies without slavery to chocolate without slavery. The move to our favourite chocolate company was an obvious one for Henk, who took the reins early on (with Ben joining a bit later). We’re still waiting on our weekly delivery though…

Meera Sodha cookbook writer

Meera won the innocent scholarship back in 2012 so she could go to India in search of her gran’s tastiest recipes. Then she wrote a cookbook containing them. And another one. And then another one.

Anthony Fletcher CEO at graze

Anthony was working at innocent when he got a graze box delivered through the post, so he drove over to their office and asked for a job. Bad news for us, great news for the snack-in-the-box company.

Lucy Thomas and Lucy Ede founders at Tastemakers

After meeting at innocent, the two Lucys set up their own food innovation company. So if you’ve got a pressing question about the food industry, just ask Lucy (either one).

Craig Jones founder at Fiovana

Craig joined innocent to learn from the best (his words) about how to start a drinks business, so when the opportunity popped up, he did exactly that. Fancy cordials delivered to your door (just don’t call them squash).

Brontë Aurell founder at Scandi Kitchen

When Brontë worked at innocent, her claim to fame was that she knitted the first Big Knit hat. A few years later she opened the first Scandi Kitchen café. Two claims, two fames (and some pretty great pastries).

Paul Brown founder at BOL

Paul helped launch innocent veg pots (RIP) in 2008, and seven years later he launched his very own ones. Ever since then, he’s been making it easy for busy people to prepare healthy food in under five minutes.

Joe Taylor founder at Real Handful

After a fruitful three years at innocent and a trip to the Grand Canyon (where he discovered tasty trail mix), Joe decided to start his own healthy snacking company. We’re still jealous of how good the name is.