James Reed: all about business

Reed Global
  • 4.4 (415)
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Updated Weekly

'James Reed: all about business' puts you at the heart of fun, dynamic, candid conversation with business leaders, philanthropists and charitable celebrities as they use their journeys to give clear, actionable advice. Hosted by James Reed CBE, the Chairman and CEO of Reed Group, you’ll hear the highs and lows of what it means to be a true business leader to empower you to implement smarter, more meaningful strategy in your business or career.

  1. 1d ago

    94. How to write a business plan and manage cash flow in year one | Emma Jones

    You can start a business for under £100, but building one that lasts requires navigating a minefield of practical, legal, and financial decisions. In this episode of All About Business, James sits down with Emma Jones to break down the mechanics of turning an idea into a fully operational company. Emma walks through the real-world choices every founder faces. From writing a lightweight five-page business plan to deciding whether to trade as a sole trader or a limited company. Emma shares why cash flow, not profit, is the ultimate reality test for a startup, how to protect your brand name without spending thousands, and why bootstrapping for as long as possible gives you complete commercial clarity. This short episode delivers a practical blueprint for managing your admin efficiently, choosing the right insurance, and ensuring your business stays cash-solvent from day one. Timestamps (Audio) 05:13 Sole Trader vs Limited 07:50 Registering and Accountants 10:08 Outsource and Hire Smart 13:35 Protect Your IP 17:13 Bootstrapping on a Budget 19:02 Funding Options 20:45 Costs, Cash and Getting Paid Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Emma Jones on LinkedIn Find out more about Enterprise Nation and the support they offer here Find out more about the Small Business Commissioner here Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  2. Aug 24

    93. How to start a business: The step by step guide | Emma Jones

    How do you start a business? In this episode of All About Business, James sits down with Emma Jones, serial entrepreneur, founder of Enterprise Nation, and the UK’s Small Business Commissioner. This is part one of a three-part masterclass on starting a business from scratch. Emma delivers practical, step-by-step advice on how to spot market gaps, validate ideas through smart market research, and build a focused niche. Emma shares insight on why testing a business as a side hustle gives you the space to refine your model, how to navigate early-stage co-founder decisions, and why sharing your idea early brings crucial feedback rather than stolen IP. This short episode gives a clear, realistic blueprint for knowing if your business idea is worth pursuing, leveraging free resources to test demand, and cultivating the daily resilience needed to keep going. Timestamps 02:48 Why Start a Business 09:03 Test and Hustle 11:03 Common Early Mistakes 16:54 Skills and Resilience 19:16 Co-Founders and Mentors Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Emma Jones on LinkedIn Find out more about Enterprise Nation and the support they offer here Find out more about the Small Business Commissioner here Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  3. Aug 17

    92. When should you hire, raise or expand? The lessons from Forest Bikes | Caroline Seton

    When do you hire, when do you raise, and when is expansion actually the right move? In this episode of All About Business, James sits down with Forest co-founder Caroline Seton to pull back the curtain on how a London startup scaled to over two million rides a month. From using smart pricing to make customers do the heavy lifting in logistics, to navigating 33 separate sets of local regulations, Caroline breaks down the raw operational tactics and tough strategic trade-offs required to build, survive, and scale an asset-heavy business. Caroline gives a clear blueprint for turning operational headaches into profit drivers as they explore protecting margins through relentless asset care, knowing exactly when to double down, or kill an idea that isn't working. Timestamps 01:38 Why Forest Started 10:32 Expanding Across London 15:09 Maintenance at Scale 21:38 Proof It Was Working 31:33 ULEZ and Space Reallocation 38:26 Making London Cycle Capital 44:50 Founder Advice and Tailwinds Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Caroline Seton on LinkedIn Find out more about Forest Bikes and their services HERE Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  4. Aug 10

    91. How to build your own talent pipeline | Lisa Bryer OBE & Charlie Kennard MBE

    If your industry is facing a talent shortage or failing to prepare the next generation of workers, the solution isn't to wait for traditional institutions to adapt, it's to build the training infrastructure yourself. In this episode of All About Business, James sits down with Oscar-nominated film producer Lisa Bryer OBE, and Day One Trust CEO Charlie Kennard MBE. Together, they break down a practical masterclass in rapid business execution, industry-led talent pipelines, and building teams that deliver under high-stakes pressure. Lisa shares how turning a 24-hour corporate bankruptcy into the birth of Cowboy Films, proved that operational agility outweighs legacy credentials. Charlie details how partnering directly with major global enterprises created a sustainable, job-ready workforce model that prioritizes work-ethic discipline, and real-world execution over academic theory. This episode gives a clear blueprint for building talent pipelines in your own sector, turning unexpected crises into business momentum, and instilling non-negotiable professional behaviors across your workforce. Timestamps 02:46 Lisa Builds Cowboy Films 06:17 Charlie Starts The Schools 17:47 Who The School Is For 25:14 Behaviours For Career Success 36:07 Industry Led Curriculum 38:59 Alumni Success Stories 56:26 Advice For Creatives Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Charlie Kennard MBE on LinkedIn Find out more about London Screen Academy and their work Find out more about Comby Films and their work Find out more about Day One Trust and their work Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  5. Aug 3

    90. The lowest-risk way to scale a start-up | Jake Wilmot-Sitwell

    Are you exhausting resources trying to build every system from scratch? You could achieve faster, safer, scale by taking a proven playbook. And executing it better than anyone else. In this episode of All About Business, James speaks with Jake Wilmot-Sitwell, co-founder and COO of Sandbox VR UK. Jake shares how he transitioned from venture capital to entrepreneurship, taking on £10M in capital to scale full-body, immersive VR experiences across the UK and Ireland. Jake breaks down the core mechanics of their expansion strategy, explaining how a master franchise model eliminated the initial tech-development risk. He details their shift from capital-intensive flagship locations to lean, plug-and-play concession hubs, while sharing actionable frameworks for optimizing yield per square foot, leveraging media partnerships like Netflix, and scaling a frontline workforce. Timestamps 01:56 Why VR and Entrepreneurship 09:57 Who Comes and Why It Works 22:40 High-End Tech Meets Hospitality 32:42 Hiring Young Teams 41:26 Fixes VAT Wages Rates 51:58 Future IP Partnerships Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Jake Wilmot-Sitwell on LinkedIn Find out more about Sandbox VR and their experiences here Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  6. Jul 27

    89. The business decision you'll thank yourself for in 5 years | James Perry

    When your business hits an existential wall, are you willing to rethink your entire financial structure to protect your vision, or will you compromise the mission just to survive? Most founders believe scaling requires bowing to traditional venture capital and prioritizing short-term margins. COOK proved there is another way by surviving near-bankruptcy, funding its own expansion through an unexpected subsidiary, and scaling past £100 million while keeping absolute control over its mission. In this episode of All About Business, James Perry, co-founder of COOK and co-founder of B Corp UK joins as guest, and he pulls back the curtain on the messy, high-stakes reality of building a national consumer brand from scratch without burning out or selling out. They unpack the reality of operational risk, the hard lessons of founder resilience, and how building an inclusive hiring model through the RAW initiative turned a perceived workplace risk into one of their strongest operational assets. James shares the gritty mechanics behind COOK’s early years: how a loss-making enterprise was kept afloat by a cash-generating bakery, why he turned away standard venture capital, and how leveraging national media attention led to finding the patient, long-term private capital that saved the business. He breaks down how the 2008 financial crash tested their model and why a relentless focus on product integrity built a moat that traditional competitors couldn't cross. Timestamps 02:08 Cadbury Lessons 10:00 Family Bakery Origins 12:56 Founding Cook 28:48 B Corp Beginnings 37:10 Certifying and Building UK 41:05 RAW Talent Hiring Program 49:19 Systemic Capitalism Glitch Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow James Perry on LinkedIn Find out more COOK and their products here Find out more about B Lab UK and their work here Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  7. Jul 20

    88. How to build a disruptive product without outspending industry giants | Mark Rushmore

    Most consumer goods brands ask you to buy more - SURI does the opposite. They designed a sustainable, electric toothbrush made from plant-based materials that is fully recyclable. As a result they scaled to over £50 million worth of sales in just four years. In this episode of All About Business, James speaks with Mark Rushmore, co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer of Sustainable Rituals, SURI. The fast-growing personal care brand that’s disrupting a defended, multi-billion-pound market by proving that daily wellness routines don't have to come at the cost of the planet. Mark shares his journey from the corporate training ground of Procter & Gamble to navigating extreme burnout after his first agency exit. He explains the business mechanics behind SURI’s rapid scale, and why focusing on a "minimum lovable product" unlocked a viral wave of word-of-mouth growth. James and Mark explore the strategies behind scaling a highly productive 50-person team, using AI as an operational accelerant rather than a replacement, and the practical frameworks for making tough business decisions. They examine how to establish a values-led culture, why investing in founder relationships with business psychologists is critical to preventing scale-up failure, and what the next generation of consumer brands must do to win. This leaves us with a compelling question: when building a product for the long term, are you treating your business decisions like a temporary hat, a reversible haircut, or a permanent tattoo? Timestamps 04:19 Burnout and Life Reset 16:36 Origin Story of SURI 25:08 Pricing Strategy and Lovable Product 31:42 Competing with Giants and Expert Team 37:51 Hiring Values Framework 46:13 Brand Expansion Vision 51:55 Decision Making Lessons Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Mark Rushmore on LinkedIn Find out more SURI and their products here Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

  8. Jul 13

    87. How to start and scale a charity: Supporting 7000 kids a week through football | Charlie Hyman

    Most charities are told to secure funding before they spend. Bloomsbury Football did the opposite — investing in fundraising before the money existed, and growing from four children to 7,000 a week as a result. In this episode of All About Business, James speaks with Charlie Hyman, founder and CEO of Bloomsbury Football. His fast-growing social enterprise harnesses the universal power of grassroots football to tackle major societal challenges for young people, providing thousands of disadvantaged youth with vital role models, mental health support, and a true sense of belonging. Charlie shares the 7 steps in starting, building and scaling a charity. He explains the business mechanics behind this scale: how diversifying income with brands like Mastercard and Adobe, and treating a charity like a high-growth private company unlocks true scale. James and Charlie explore the strategy behind taking Bloomsbury national and how Charlie built a proprietary AI tool to scrape Charity Commission data for fundraising intelligence. They examine how to close high-value deals, attract top-tier corporate talent with pure purpose, and what commercial businesses can learn from high-ambition social enterprise models. This leaves us with a compelling question: when building a company designed for impact, do your growth strategies reflect the actual size of the problem you are trying to solve? Timestamps 03:05 Origin story volunteering 11:47 Income streams and bids 15:53 Charities vs businesses 21:23 Scaling leadership and coaches 32:12 Opportunistic Expansion Plans 38:12 AI Boosting Charity Impact 44:59 Fundraising Skills for Youth Links Follow James Reed on LinkedIn Follow Charlie Hyman on LinkedIn Find out more Bloomsbury Football here Submit your application to Reed’s Entrepreneurs Fund for a chance to a £20,000 grant HERE All About Business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more HERE This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast to elevate your brand, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk

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4.4
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'James Reed: all about business' puts you at the heart of fun, dynamic, candid conversation with business leaders, philanthropists and charitable celebrities as they use their journeys to give clear, actionable advice. Hosted by James Reed CBE, the Chairman and CEO of Reed Group, you’ll hear the highs and lows of what it means to be a true business leader to empower you to implement smarter, more meaningful strategy in your business or career.

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