Business Needs to Be Smarter, Says Will Waldron

Speaking at Chivas Regal’s The Venture final pitch in San Francisco last week, Will Waldron, co-founder of social enterprise Two Fingers Brewing and one of 16 global finalists in the competition, says that brands and companies should be thinking about a different approach to business in today’s world.

Waldron’s company, which he founded with six other ex-agency colleagues, brews and sells its own brand of beer to raise proceeds (at least 10 pence from each bottle) for prostate cancer research. Now a board member at agency iris Worldwide, the young entrepreneur was in San Francisco for the competition’s Accelerator Week round which culminated on Friday night with a live pitch event.

“I’m not trying to create something new,” says Waldron. “I’m celebrating and embellishing something that’s already happening.” Perhaps even more important than the funds raised by the company through beer sales is the chance that the target male consumers will get talking - and tested - after drinking the beer.

“We’re trying to take it to another level, and if people go and get themselves checked because of drinking our beer, then that’s absolutely job done and I can go home because if that prevents them from dying of prostate cancer then that’s a life saved.”

It’s clear Waldron is passionate about the plan and is a firm believer that you can do business, have fun and help the world at the same time – which is the gist of Havas Worldwide London and Pernod Ricard’s The Venture campaign, which saw the 15 other finalists also in the US city for the final phase.

“We did some research to see whether our beer was actually having an effect on people, in a good way obviously, and we found that just over half of the people who drank our beer spoke about prostate cancer to friends and family,” adds Waldron.

The findings also suggested that 13 per cent of consumers who drank Two Fingers Brewing’s Aurelio Golden Artisan Beer actually went and got tested. The drink has been sold in supermarket’s including Tesco, Morrisons and Ocado and has been stocked at Jamie Oliver's restaurants and Google UK’s offices.

“We’re already thinking about what else we can do at Two Fingers Brewing,” continues Waldron. “There’s definitely a different way of doing it. People buy into companies now which offer more than just the product. It’s all about what they’re adding value to in the world. If I see a range of waters on a shelf, for instance, and one donates money to Water Aid, I’ll pick that one over Vittel or evian. It makes me feel better about myself, it’s doing better for the environment and I’m getting what I wanted which is a nice fresh, cold water.”

Two Fingers Brewing was started three years ago but the company has only been trading for half of that time and none of the team take a salary from what’s sold. The exposure and mentoring from The Venture experience will prove invaluable for the business that Waldron refers to as “a hobby”.

”I’m never going to run a marathon,” he says, “and you don’t need to be so worthy about it; we can have fun. We really think we can do this. We’ve said when it stops being fun we’ll call it a day but we love the whole industry and the people you meet. People that work in the beer industry like consumer choice. We’re getting a lot of help and advice so it’s been amazing.”

The plan is to target pubs next with UK chain J D Wetherspoon listed as a potential stockist.

To read our coverage from The Venture live pitch final event click here.