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Age of Innocent

PQ Magazine visited Innocent's HQ in south-west London to find out what makes the company's finance team tick

Steve Johnson is a happy man. In fact, most of the office staff at Innocent seem to look very chirpy indeed. Maybe its to do with all the free smoothies they get, meaning they've got more vitamins coursing through their bodies than a Tour de France cyclist. Or it could be to do with the way things are run at the company. The founders sit in the open plan office with their employees - so no unapproachable managerial hideaways - there are comfy bean bags in one area, table football in another, and the whole place is bright, colourful and pretty much filled with astroturf. Not your average office at all. It all sounds too good to be true, but the staff really do seem happy to be there.

Steve's job is commercial accountant at Innocent, and he's worked for the company for two years. "I want to understand what makes a business successful, and sticking around for a while helps you do that. And I'm definitely in the right place to find out."

Steve didn't study a finance-based subject at university. His degree is in European Studies - French, history and Portuguese - from Nottingham University. At A-level he completed maths, history and French, and he liked the mix of numbers, writing essays and languages.

However, when it came to degree level, he found it frustrating that he couldn't continue that mix of different subjects and that he had to focus on one subject. So choosing to cover language and history at university, he decided he would study for a professional qualification to enable him to keep going with the numbers side of things. And accountancy seemed ideal for his needs.

"I came out of university with this degree and the first impression people had was, 'oh, he's a bit arty'," Steve explains. "I wanted to change that, and I thought if I do the CIMA qualification I get to understand business, which is really important. And it meant I'd get to prove I wasn't only an 'arts' type person.

"So that's why actually doing the qualification itself was beneficial to me, rather than just getting to the end. I looked at all the qualifications, and it seemed that the ones that were the most popular with employers were CIMA and ICAEW. There were a few ACA jobs I saw but the thing that worried me was going to see lots of companies, and not getting under the skin of how it works, and how they actually make money. With CIMA, I was able to go into a business, fully understand it and get the most out of it. Maybe you do sacrifice a bit of breadth, but you get that depth.

"CIMA just fitted with the way I do things. For example, when I go on holiday I don't like to dot around to different places, I like to go somewhere and really get to know it. And Innocent is a great place to learn - working in the same office as the guys who've taken the business from a bedroom to what it is today. To be that close to them, have meetings with them - you stand a chance of working out what works in business."

It seems like Steve has hankerings to be a bit of an entrepreneur himself. Is there a temptation to try to recreate his own company in the Innocent mould? "I've heard too many people tell me 'if I'd gone on my own I'd be a millionaire'. And every time I've heard that, I've thought well, why don't you go on your own then! Why stick around and end up in your 50s or 60s saying 'if only I'd done this'. So yes, I think I have entrepreneurial tendencies." Being part of Innocent seems ideal for an entrepreneur in waiting - the three founders of the business know what they're talking about when it comes to building up a company from scratch. "Because those guys got to my age, about 26, and decided not to take the safe option and work for someone else, they risked it all and went for it on their own, you've got that atmosphere here, that people aren't afraid to take risks. No one's frightened to put in place an idea that they've thought of, and it's a really good attitude to have.

"Before I came to Innocent I worked for a Fortune 500 company. I worked with some good accountants, and learnt some useful things, but there wasn't a lot of opportunity for me to have an idea and get it pushed through because you had to go through so many people. Whereas here, I thought there was more opportunity, if I had the right idea, for me to make things happen. And that's how it is."

The reputation that Innocent has for being a people-based company, as well as having a list of staff perks as long as your arm, would seem to suggest that people will be knocking the door down to get a job there. What was it about Steve that got him the job? "I decided to move to London, and I was going to get a flat sorted and then look for a job. But I sent a few CVs out first, just to test the water. Innocent were looking for somebody with my skills in supply chain. They gave me a little bit of homework for the interview, just to get a feel for how I work, as a bit of a challenge. So while I was working on the challenge I thought if I drink smoothies while I'm doing it, maybe it'll give me what I need. But I wouldn't recommend anyone drink too many smoothies late at night, as they do tend to keep you awake and I did kind of overdose on them. But it worked for me in the interview!"

Consumer relationship

Coming from a more 'straight-laced' company, Steve also finds the whole laid-back ethos of the drinks company very refreshing, and indeed this is one of the company's quirks that has made the brand so popular and recognisable with its consumer base. Rather than simply list the ingredients on its bottles, Innocent uses the label space to almost have a chat with their customers. "If you're going to communicate with someone about the ingredients, it's a chance to have a bit of a laugh and it becomes more of a relationship with the consumer rather than simply a list of ingredients. I thought that was a fantastic idea, I wish I'd thought of it, but I wouldn't mind working for people who think like that. For years and years people have been producing bog-standard packaging without seeing this opportunity."

So having observed the Innocent business model first-hand, what lessons can Steve take away when it comes to potentially starting up his own company? "I think actually what they did links in, in my head, with the CIMA qualification as well. What those guys did was they established themselves with a platform - they had a good background and business knowledge from the jobs they had been doing previously. That's what I want from CIMA - to be a qualified accountant, to understand how business works. And that puts me in a position then to say, if I do take a risk, if I do go off and set up my own business, if it does go wrong and you end up bankrupt or whatever, you still have a qualification and there's going to be jobs out there, and you'll be able to recover.

"In fact I've heard Richard, one of the guys who set up the company, say that anyone can be an entrepreneur if they weren't afraid to give it a go. I think by getting a qualification like CIMA you remove one of those fear factors, and it allows you to take more risks.

"It's more interesting to take risks and have ideas, because in finance it's very easy to do what your boss has done, or follow the way they think. It's a profession where it's difficult to challenge what's going on. But here you're encouraged to think differently. It might go wrong, but at least you're moving forward and you learn from that.

"Things can't progress if they're stagnant, you have to keep moving, which is something I've learnt from being here."

So there you have it. Innocent is altogether a quite different company to work for, from its offices to its founders to its encouragement to anyone to get involved with any area of the business.

Staff members are encouraged to be themselves; no corporate cloning goes on here. For example, Steve likes to work standing up with his laptop balanced on some boxes. Of course, no one bats an eyelid. If it works for him, that's great. Now that's refreshing.

Awards won by Innocent:

• Growth Strategy of the Year and Business Innovation of the Year (kids) at the National Business Awards 2006
• Company of the Year and Brand Campaign of the Year at the Business XL Awards 2006
• Supply Chain Excellence at the IGD Awards
• Fastest-growing food and drinks company in the UK in the Sunday Times Fast Track 100 list 2005
• Gold medals at the Great Taste Awards for five years in a row
• Best UK soft drink 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006 at the Quality Food & Drink Awards
• Best European Sales Promotion 2005 at the Institute of Sales Promotion Awards
• Top Employer 2005 by The Guardian
• Best Employer of the Year 2004 at the National Business Awards
• Young Entrepreneurs of the Year at the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Awards 2003
• Marketing Campaign of the Year for small to medium sized business at the Marketing Society Awards 2005

The company has grown from having zero to 64 per cent market share. In 2006, turnover was £80 million and this year it is aiming for £100 million. The team has expanded from just three people to over 164, based at Fruit Towers offices in London, Manchester, Paris, Dublin, Amsterdam and Copenhagen.