T I P S F ROM THE TOP
THE MADE IN CHELSEA STAR, 32, ON TURNING HIS DRINKING HABIT INTO A POSITIVE BY LAUNCHING A LOW-ALCOHOL BRAND THAT’S BEEN A BIG HIT
Were there signs you were a young entrepreneur in the playground?
When I was very young I used to draw and sell art. My dad had acquired property on St Barts in the Caribbean, which became the Eden Rock Hotel. Aged five, I used to sketch and sell my art to unsuspecting guests, many of whom would purchase them out of pity. I’d wait until I had 100 Caribbean dollars each time and I’d have the cashier change them into one dollar notes so I felt I had more money. Then I’d deposit it into Spencer’s Gambling Account, although gambling came later in my life. I’ve always had an eye for business but it was somewhat shut on account of my alcohol intake over the years.
You gave up a £25,000 job in the City to film Made In Chelsea… Before my job in the City, I’d been in the US and spent some time with the cast of The Hills. I realised there was no similar show in the UK so I shot a pilot but never heard back. I’d been working in the City a year when I had a phone call from the TV production company. I made ludicrous demands, all of which were shot down, but I thought it would be fun. I thought it would be a stepping stone to something else. I wasn’t expecting the popularity of the show to be quite what it was. I’ll always look back on it fondly. It was original and fun, and people really warmed to it. Maybe I stuck around for longer than I wanted to – the final series wasn’t as good or as fun – but it gave me a great insight into the world of celebrity. Once, my dream was to travel and to be paid to appear somewhere, but the interest dissipated. While filming the reality TV show The Jump I met an incredible woman – presenter Vogue Williams – and I have no desire to be famous now. My family and my business are now my heart and soul.
What about your drinking?
I would drink regularly, not always to excess but it had developed over many years and my work-drive and my interest in business was not like my dad’s or my brother’s. I was slightly lazy and a bit truculent, and I would happily pass blame on to other people for my shortcomings. I realised I might not reach my potential. Having a beer at lunch and a glass of wine with dinner was completely part of me, and I realised that if I cut that out of my life, maybe my drive would change. Just one week after giving up alcohol, I felt as if I had taken a hand-brake off – and as if I’d been driving with one on for ten years. At the same time, I realised my passion was not in television and nor was it in promoting myself. It suddenly dawned on me that aimlessly trying to gather followers on social media or seeking validation from strangers online was not me.
Was the change of heart due to becoming a dad?
I realised there was nothing out there that was a sensible replacement for full-strength alcohol. I also realised there was a negative connotation surrounding non-alcoholic beverages. Instead of being praised for, say, healthy eating, the response is, ‘You’re not drinking so you’re boring now.’ I wanted to offer an alternative that was still cool to order at a bar.
So you launched CleanCo…
I’m founder and CEO and I’m involved in everything from branding to liquid development but the most important part of my role is to use my platform and raise funds and awareness. I’d never raised money before and I remember sitting in a meeting thinking, ‘Bottles cost this and labels cost this and corks cost this,’ and doing my sums on this small scale, and the guy I had gone to for funding said, ‘Mate, you need a couple of million quid at least – you need to hire marketing lads, sales lads, operations lads, you need packaging, you need displays.’ He was right and the investment paid off. We’ve made £9.1 million in sales since we sold our very first bottle on November 14, 2019, which is pretty good going, and we turned over £3 million in our first financial year.
Did lockdown affect the launch? Mistakes… you’ve made a few?
When we launched in 2019 we didn’t expect our first batch to sell out so quickly. We sold 25,000 units in just 12 hours and the following day we literally had nothing to sell. As founder I was absolutely mortified we weren’t able to fulfil that demand. We didn’t want to have a large amount of stock unsold so we took the risk. But we learned our lesson.
CleanCo’s new range of canned cocktails feature two signature editions, CleanGin + Tonic and CleanRum + Cola