Jo Fairley, co-founder of Green & Black’s Chocolate launched this year’s Lancaster University Management School Masterclass Series, run in partnership with NatWest.

Jo captivated the audience of more than 200 business leaders from across the region, who came to hear the pioneering story of the organic chocolate company Green & Black’s; a brand that has now gone on to be ‘bigger than Marmite’ (in sales terms) and ‘cooler than Prada’ (according to two Coolbrands surveys).

In 2005, the brand was sold to Cadbury’s, but Jo remains in an ambassadorial role, travelling the world as the brand grows internationally in countries including the US and Australia.

Jo discussed the importance of product; and the significance of an organisation’s belief in its products. “If you believe it’s the best out there, it will sell” and “If you’ve got a really great product, give it away!” This was the approach that Green & Black’s took for the first nine years, amazingly without a penny spent on advertising.

Some of the key points that Jo shared were:

• Be “the conscience of the sector”. It’s important for your business to stand for something and to do good
• Have clear values, and following them
• Mentoring isn’t a one-sided conversation, it’s a two-way process
• Chocolate can change the world!

The event was part of a masterclass series run by Lancaster University Management School and supported by NatWest, which involves inspirational speakers with a passion for business sharing their knowledge and expertise to inspire SMEs. Lancaster University Management School has been running business masterclasses for more than 10 years as part of their business engagement programmes and has drawn audiences in the hundreds from across the North West’s SME networks.

To find out more about Lancaster University Management School's masterclasses, visit our website.