November 24, 2021

Tessa Clarke - OLIO - Series 3 finale

33 minutes

Welcome to the final episode in the third series of Jimmy’s Jobs of the Future.

Throughout this series, we've heard from amazing guests on topics ranging from the future of care to uncovering the hidden world of NFTs to discussing how entire technology fields are dedicated to improving women’s health.

Another emerging trend of this series has been the rise of social enterprises - whilst potentially at risk of being a buzzword, it has struck me just how many modern startups come with a mission to improve our lives and the planet.

And someone who speaks about this with more passion than anyone else is today's guest- Tessa Clarke, CEO & co-founder of sharing-app, OLIO.

Initially created to reduce food waste by allowing unwanted food to be shared with neighbours near you, the app has grown into something far greater. To date they have over 5 million users worldwide, sharing over 34 million portions of food and saving over 9 billion litres of water.

And that’s just their consumer side- businesses can work with OLIO to distribute leftover goods throughout communities and partnerships with Pret-a-Manger and even Tesco have allowed big business to reach net-zero faster.

In September of this year, OLIO announced a $43m series B round making the founders Tessa and Sacha the most heavily backed female founding team in the whole of the United Kingdom.

This series' partners, Octopus, have a mission to invest in the ideas, industries, and people that will change the world- so it comes as no surprise that OLIO is an Octopus portfolio company, having attracted their attention back in 2018 where they lead OLIO's series A round.

With a focus on true sustainability, education and action, I couldn’t think of a better company to sign off our third series before we return in 2022.

We discuss with Tessa:

Where the name OLIO came from.

Why they decided quickly to expand into services beyond food waste.

How OLIO grew from 1 million to 5 million users during the pandemic.

The difference between mission-driven founders and ‘mercenary’ founders.

Why the model of consumption is broken- and what ‘virgin retail” means.

The race to net-zero.

How making OLIO globally accessible so early allowed them to expand into unlikely markets by following the data.

How they will use their recent $43m Series B to propel OLIO forward.

Why they are hiring for a Head of Customer Insights and Head of Product Design- and what those roles actually do!

What harnessing gamification can do to spark sustainable action.

Their amazing partnership with Tesco- and how it took 3 and half years to achieve.

How they were remote working before it was cool- and why no one believed it could work.

Recruiting not just for mission fit but for mission obsession.

Books that inspired Tessa’s journey: The Lean Startup by Eric Ries & Capitalism vs the Climate by Naomi Klein.

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