Edward Sweet-Williams

Welshman on the wrong side of the bridge 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 Co-Founder @CandyKittens 🍬🚀 frustrated Cardiff City Fan.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

🚨Offices aren’t dead but rubbish offices should be!

It’s 10 weeks since we opened the doors of The Sweet Factory and here’s what I’ve learnt so far…

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

Flexibility is key! The space can adapt to the different work styles and needs of our team, but we’re also giving individuals the freedom to manage their time. We believe people who have control of their own time are more likely to be engaged and committed to our success!

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

🚨Offices aren’t dead but rubbish offices should be!

It’s 10 weeks since we opened the doors of The Sweet Factory and here’s what I’ve learnt so far…

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

Design matters! I’ve always fought that corner. Everyone has a spring in their step, and seems to be holding their head a little higher. There’s a collective pride, and it feels like (am imagining it?) we’re all bringing a little extra to live up to the great space we’re sat in.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

@DRoj @Adagio_officiel This is real “this stuff only happens to Dave Rogers” stuff

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

Due to “technical issues in the kitchen” there’s no catering trolley on tonight’s @GWRHelp … I didn’t realise they were knocking out the KitKat’s and bottled water from an onboard kitchen, fair play.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

From reselling on eBay at crazy prices, to (literally) struggling to give the stuff away 👀 where did it all go wrong for Prime?

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

Single serve waste 👎🏻

[Andrea @iiiitsandrea]

thoughts on single service olive oil? 🫒

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

I love being Welsh 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿
@Channel4 The Piano is in Cardiff tonight. First pianist owns the mountain snack bar about 5 mins from my parents house, and then a few later is the pianist that played at our wedding. Brilliant!

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

@GWRHelp here’s an idea 💡 Why don’t you don’t you give your cleaning team at Paddington, who (understandably!) know nothing about where your trains are going, a different uniform to the staff who are supposed to know the answers. Passengers stranded, and yet again nobody to help

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

There must be some sort of AI at work when my phone decides to play this song as I wait for (yet another!) late @GWRHelp train to turn up.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

@DRoj Might be your best yet.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

Nice little mortality reminder from @nestpensions to brighten up my Monday 😇

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

This 👇🏻

[Eye for Retail @EyeforRetail_]

CPG founders: Dominating your local market first is critically important.

You will always be strongest in your local market.

You know all the best stores to approach first.

When you are visualizing your plan, you can see it play out in the local market, you know it so well.

You also know a lot of people who can have some influence and help you get your product in stores. Your friends and family will support you, buy your product, tell other people about it.

You will receive promotional opportunities through contacts that others would never know about. And you are in the market. You naturally walk in and out of stores in everyday life. You have your finger on the pulse and can move quickly if anything changes.

You can over-service your customers.

Your friends, your mom, your friends' moms will do things like ask stores why they don't have your product or straighten up your product on shelf when they see it on the weekend.

All these little 1% increments add up.

So if you can't dominate your local market, you're not ready to go anywhere else.

Shooting for national distribution too early can be both a vanity achievement and a death sentence for a young business.

Perhaps pushed by the need to tell investors a compelling story.

But you could spread yourself too thin. And under-service your product.

You will not even know that despite being on the planogram and theoretically being ranged, the product hasn't made it out of the storeroom in that store in Minnesota, or the one in Iowa, or North Carolina.

You will discover that the merchandizing field team that you rely on, isn't that reliable. What they tell you is happening in store isn't truly the case when you turn up unannounced.

No shoppers will know what your product is in a new market because it might be in Target but they've never seen it anywhere else like the local mom and pop grocer or convenience store.

Before you know it, your units per store per week sales numbers are not meeting benchmarks. And you are called in for a meeting with the buyer.

Or worse, you just get the dreaded email. And you're out after six or twelve months.

So stay focused and disciplined. Dominate your local market first.

Then use what you have learned to start a new market.

Then once you have succeeded in a new market, make that your new market playbook that you keep iterating.

It will take longer than you think.

But then you are ready to expand.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

@alexgarcia_atx They’re crushing it, but 10 weeks is very misleading. They’ve nailed the strategy and execution, but like every other brand in the world, there’s no overnight success!

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

Imagine running a company as incompetent as @GWRHelp - I use your trains at least 3 times/wk. I can’t remember a journey that ran without a problem… staff shortages, running on reduced power, computer failures, breakdowns, no F&B service etc. Invariably late & always overpriced.

[Edward Sweet-Williams @Edward_Williams]

UNREAL EFFORT 🙌🏼

[Russ Cook @hardestgeezer]

The first person ever to run the entire length of Africa. Mission complete🫡

[Wales 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 @Cymru]

🌼 “Be joyful, keep the faith & do the little things. Gwnewch y pethau bychain.”

Dydd #GŵylDewi hapus! 🫶🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

#TogetherStronger