YF's Supply Chain Systems team can help scope, build, integrate and roll out new systems within your business. Whether you are looking for inventory management, advanced Excel builds with macros or other systems, the YF team can give you certainty of success.

Categories covered: Systems & Software

LegalEdge help high growth businesses with everything to do with legal. From everyday advisory, to corporate, commercial, IP or employment, they have a specialist in the team to help. They can work on one-off projects or as an outsourced legal counsel - and they pride themselves on a simple, cost-effective and commercial approach.

Categories covered: Legal

As the world’s largest privately held insurance broker, Lockton is a leader in risk management, insurance, employee benefits consulting, and retirement services. They support in insurance for our brands including Public Liability, Product Liability, Product Recall, Transit, Employers Liability and lots more.

Categories covered: Insurance

Talking Heads have vast experience of providing translation services to food and drink brands. They translate labels to be locally compliant, ensure brand voice is retained across languages, launch international websites and localise content.

Categories covered: Label Compliance Checks, Packaging Translation, Legal

The Food Exchange is a building of private office spaces based in the New Covent Garden Market in Nine Elms. It is modern and spacious and built exclusively for use by small businesses in the food & drink sector. Tenants include Young Foodies as well as a number of brands in the YF network. There are limited spaces available so get in touch if you would like a viewing.

Categories covered: Office

YF's recruitment team find fantastic talent at all levels of the organisation, from Executive Search for MDs, Sales Directors and more, to graduate field sales roles and everything in between. We are the single most popular recruiter for the YF community with a fantastic track record of success.

Categories covered: Recruitment

YF is the largest training provider for challenger FMCG brands in the UK, with more than 30 courses across all specialisms. You can purchase course tickets directly on our website or speak to a member of the team for a bespoke team quote. Most popular courses include Negotiation, New Business, Excel and Management.

Categories covered: Training

FizzPopBang are specialists in Brand Employee Engagement: helping you make sure that your internal culture is matched to the brilliant promises your brand makes to your customers. They believe this makes for the best, most high performing companies.

 Categories covered: HR, Training, CSR and Leadership, Employee Engagment & Company Culture

Louise Hemming is a Leadership Coach. An MBTI / NLP & Motivational Maps practitioner & coach with a wealth of experience in HR, delivering learning solutions and talent development.

She spent seven years in retail operations before moving into HR. She has held senior HR and Learning & Development roles in Compass Group, Granada and Sainsbury over twenty years before moving to work in consultancy in a range of sectors.

Categories covered: HR, Training, CSR and Leadership

Rachel is a CSR and leadership professional, with experience spanning NGOs, government and corporate entities. She has 20 years of experience in developing successful, measurable CSR strategies for Sainsbury’s, Barclays and government, and worked on projects to reduce food waste and environmental impact.

Categories covered: Certifications (e.g. B-corp), Environment - Other, CSR and Leadership

Jack Milner provides organisations and individuals with all the tools required to influence, persuade and engage – in short, he shows attendees ‘how to speak like a stand up’.

And his coaching works. According to London Speakers Bureau (the biggest speaking agency outside the US) the 3 top selling speakers in 2018 were all coached by Jack Milner. The international ON24 Best Webinar winners for 2019, RED WHALE, were coached by Jack Milner

Categories covered: Networking, Events, Training

David Henson is The Slide Presentation Man. If you want visual presentations that are engaging, empowering and effective, David can design and produce your presentations or train you and your staff to do so.

Categories covered: Design, Training

YF Funding is YF's fundraising department, built in partnership with leading consumer investment bank, Spayne Lindsay. YF Funding specialises in brands looking to raise £1-5m through strategic and institutional capital. The team have a 600 strong investor network to suit the brands' ambitions.

Categories covered: Fundraising

Angel Investment Network (AIN) is one of the largest angel groups in the UK, with more than 250,000 angels on record. As a mailing list, you prepare your pitch information and materials and then send it out to the network. Interested investors will get in touch.

Categories covered: Fundraising

Datafox supports brands to claim back cash for innovation. They specialise in R&D refund claims for F&B brands and have claimed over £22million, including for several YF brands. They operate on a ‘No win, no fee’ basis.

Categories covered: R&D Tax Credits, Alternative Financing

GapCap specialises in bolstering cash flows for SMEs through invoice financing. They can offer either selective invoice financing or allow you to draw down against the entire sales ledger. They work with a lot of high growth consumer brands working with retailers.

Categories covered: Alternative Financing

Harlands Accountants are a Durham based accountancy firm specialising in food & drink manufacturing, among other sectors. They work with a number of our brands as their outsourced finance teams and can also provide ad hoc FD advisory.

Categories covered: Accountancy

Portt & Co are experienced in assisting growing businesses with specialist accounting advice and can provide payroll specialists, finance directors, management accountants and bookkeepers. They work with brands on either a retained basis (as outsourced accounting team) or ad hoc finance projects.

Categories covered: Accountancy

Seedrs is one of the largest crowdfunding platforms in the UK, very popular with food & drink brands. In fact, 82% of food and drink campaigns successfully raise the funds they need on Seedrs. If you are looking to raise funds soon, it is worth getting in touch with them.

Categories covered: Fundraising

Eco3 are an environmental and innovation consultancy. They help clients develop better products and packaging with lower environmental impact. They deliver astonishing value having identified cost savings of over £53 million for clients in the last four years. They take a bespoke approach to deliver the most appropriate solution for your business.

Categories covered: Sustainable packaging, Environment - Other

Nali consulting offers technical services to SMEs and start-ups within FMCG. They assist with formulation, quality control and assurance, and packaging. They hand-hold through the innovation process to ensure the client has a successful and smooth product launch.

Categories covered: Sustainable Packaging, Technical Consultancy, Health Claim Queries, New Product Development

Rachel is a CSR and leadership professional, with experience spanning NGOs, government and corporate entities. She has 20 years of experience in developing successful, measurable CSR strategies for Sainsbury’s, Barclays and government, and worked on projects to reduce food waste and environmental impact.

Categories covered: Certifications (e.g. B-corp), Environment - Other, CSR and Leadership

YF's Community is the most well renowned community in the sector. YF works exclusively with high growth, ambitious brands. The Community itself is for scale up brands (£500k turnover to £30m+), while startup brands can join the Lite Mailing List to gain valuable support from the YF team. To apply for membership, visit the website.

Categories covered: Networking, Events

GS1 UK is the UK's arm of the global barcoding body. They are the go-to people to buy your barcodes from (do not buy from anywhere else!) and also have solutions to support brands in the handling and management of their product data. As a partner of YF, they support SMEs in a number of ways and so we recommend becoming a member.

Categories covered: Barcodes, Events, Networking

Jack Milner provides organisations and individuals with all the tools required to influence, persuade and engage – in short, he shows attendees ‘how to speak like a stand up’.

And his coaching works. According to London Speakers Bureau (the biggest speaking agency outside the US) the 3 top selling speakers in 2018 were all coached by Jack Milner. The international ON24 Best Webinar winners for 2019, RED WHALE, were coached by Jack Milner

Categories covered: Networking, Events, Training

Barrows is a design and activation agency helping brands to cut through to their brand identity (logo, colour, tone of voice, style). They also connect consumers to brands through experiential marketing (sampling, trade shows, activations, POS). They have an in-house staffing team and event production capabilities.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Market Research, Digital Marketing, Social Media, Active Sales Support, Design

Flexforce is one of the largest field marketing and sales agencies in the UK, combining years of experience of tactical field management and knowledge with cutting edge technology and data to give true returns. They help brands by going into store and ensuring compliance on shelf, implementing merchandising and more.

Categories covered: Field Compliance

Flavor Sampling is a specialist sampling agency. They can manage a variety of different techniques and campaign types to deliver optimal results for every campaign. They look after all sampling elements under one roof to drive efficiencies in targeting, relevance, measurement and ROI.

Categories covered: Market Research, Field Compliance, Active Sales Support, Marketing - Other, Sampling

Harris and Hayes are food and drink industry experts who help brands innovate smarter. Their insights and research add value throughout the development process from ideation to execution, including future forecasting, concept testing, and translating emerging consumer trends and behaviours into commercially viable product opportunities.

Categories covered: Market Research, Commercial Strategy

Harry was once the founder of a £3m FMCG brand and now helps challenger brands to strategise, launch, sell and maximise growth potential. He understands the challenges and pitfalls faced by entrepreneurs in this space and can help them to secure major grocery listings, grow wholesale customers and more. He can work on an ongoing or project basis.

Categories covered: Commercial Strategy, Active Sales Support, Sales - Other

Lee Gurteen is a sales director with many years experience in commercial functions of high growth FMCG brands. In his most recent roles, he was the Sales Director for CafePod. He has experience in both the out of home and grocery markets, working with every major UK retailer as well as international expansion.

Categories covered: Commercial Strategy, Active Sales Support, Sales - Other

Having worked in FMCG for over 10 years, Neill launched his own consultancy in 2016 to help brands across multiple categories to achieve their objectives across multiple channels. He provides short, medium and long-term support with everything from sales strategy and commercial proposals, to account management and business development.

Categories covered:  Commercial Strategy, Active Sales Support, Sales - Other

One Step Ahead specialise in sales and marketing support for exporters in the food and drink sector. With experience of working in 85 countries, in all routes to market, they have knowledge in the requirements to establish distribution in a variety of settings. They have worked with start ups and early stage businesses who are seeking to expand their products into the international arena.

Categories covered: Export Support

Simona has worked in the F&B industry for more than 10 years now, covering roles from both Supply Chain and Procurement. Her core services include product placement, new sales generation, admin and systems development. She has been a buyer in the food & drink industry for 3+ years and has a strong passion for all things food.

Categories covered: Active Sales Support, Sales - Other

Phil’s 30 years of experience in sales and marketing spans everything from store management at M&S to commercial operations at Café Pod in its earliest days. He now works with challenger brands to develop and implement robust commercial strategies by identifying high-potential sales channels.

Categories covered: Commercial Strategy, Active Sales Support, Sales - Other

Wave is an experiential marketing agency that work with brands either conceptually or practically to deliver engaging real life experiences with customers. Among their services is sampling & in-field activations, store compliance and merchandising Visits, staffing & the provision of brand ambassadors, mystery shopping and more.

Categories covered: Market Research, Field Compliance, Active Sales Support, Marketing - Other, Sampling

John advises and supports brands who want to expand internationally. He is a sales expert with over 25 years of experience in international FMCG business development, having led international divisions at PepsiCo, Twinings and Quorn Foods. He has worked successfully on either project basis or ongoing with a number of YF brands.

Categories covered: Export Support

Barrows is a design and activation agency helping brands to cut through to their brand identity (logo, colour, tone of voice, style). They also connect consumers to brands through experiential marketing (sampling, trade shows, activations, POS). They have an in-house staffing team and event production capabilities.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Market Research, Digital Marketing, Social Media, Active Sales Support, Design

BasicArts provide strategic advice for high growth businesses who want to disrupt their markets and make a dent on popular culture. They run holistic brand consultancy projects to give you a powerful positioning in the context of your category. They are one of the best rated providers that YF works with.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Market Research, Category Advisory

Fifty helps marketers direct their attention in the right place. The Fifty Audience Platform is capable of producing deep analysis and audience insight into any audience at scale. This data is presented in a dynamic and clear way, empowering marketers to make better decisions with regards to strategy, creative messaging and targeting.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing, Market Research, Category Advisory, Data Purchasing

Flavor Sampling is a specialist sampling agency. They can manage a variety of different techniques and campaign types to deliver optimal results for every campaign. They look after all sampling elements under one roof to drive efficiencies in targeting, relevance, measurement and ROI.

Categories covered: Market Research, Field Compliance, Active Sales Support, Marketing - Other, Sampling

MRQual is a research agency owned and run by Richard Clark. They specialise in the consumer packaged goods sector, and work mainly in such areas as testing of new product ideas, concepts and packaging designs, as well as brand perception, usage and attitude, and customer segmentation research.

Categories covered: Market Research

One Pulse is a self-serve platform that turns market research into an engaging, real-time conversation with consumers. Send Pulses (3-question micro surveys) to your target demographic in their OnePulse mobile app community and you will get responses within minutes.

Categories covered: Data Purchasing, Market Research

Spoonshot's platform uses AI, food science, and large, diverse data sets to provide insights into future trends, Brands use this platform to help identify NPD opportunities and inspire innovation.

Categories covered: Data Purchasing, Market Research, Category Advisory

CBROS is a full service creative studio, executing creative across brand identity and packaging, branded content, digital marketing, PR and UI/UX design. They can run one off branding exercises or manage your marketing day to day, or both. They specialise in brands that are story-led and work with a number of FMCG challengers.

Categories covered: Product Branding, PR, Digital Marketing, Design, Social Media, Market Research, Marketing - Other

Contact: [email protected] / [email protected] - for brand requests

Harris and Hayes are food and drink industry experts who help brands innovate smarter. Their insights and research add value throughout the development process from ideation to execution, including future forecasting, concept testing, and translating emerging consumer trends and behaviours into commercially viable product opportunities.

Categories covered: Market Research, Commercial Strategy

Wave is an experiential marketing agency that work with brands either conceptually or practically to deliver engaging real life experiences with customers. Among their services is sampling & in-field activations, store compliance and merchandising Visits, staffing & the provision of brand ambassadors, mystery shopping and more.

Categories covered: Market Research, Field Compliance, Active Sales Support, Marketing - Other, Sampling

Acorni is a specialist Amazon agency made up of advertising specialists and e-commerce consultants. They use retail analytics to take a data led approach to scaling the account. Whether brands are looking to launch on Amazon or need an ongoing fully managed service, they are worth speaking to. They are best for brands at later stages of life.

Categories covered: Amazon

AcorBlack Label are experts in e-commerce that work with companies looking to grow their online sales. Following an initial consultation, they act as a complete Amazon division either launching you onto the platform or scaling you.ni is a specialist Amazon agency made up of advertising specialists and e-commerce consultants. They use retail analytics to take a data led approach to scaling the account. Whether brands are looking to launch on Amazon or need an ongoing fully managed service, they are worth speaking to. They are best for brands at later stages of life.

Categories covered: Amazon

Toucan are one of the most successful challenger Amazon agencies, working with brands either one-off to setup the account for success, or ongoing as an outsourced Amazon agency. They have a proven track record with many of our brands and work best with earlier stages of life.

Categories covered: Amazon

GM Ecommerce Design specialises in the production of Shopify and WordPress based websites. He can build a site from scratch including integrations will all softwares and creation of the digital marketing ecosystem to drive both acquisition and conversion on your site.

Categories covered: Web development, eCommerce - Other

Oliver Bridge is a specialist digital marketing consultant. Having founded and scaled his own D2C business to sell many millions of units, he has exited to focus on supporting other brands. He can help on an ad hoc strategy basis, or ongoing.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing, eCommerce - Other

Mechanised is a Digital Marketing agency that works alongside your business to drive growth online. They specialise in building eCommerce (Shopify) stores, SEO, Google Ads and Facebook/Instagram adverts.

Categories covered: Web Design, eCommerce - Other, Digital Marketing, Social Media

Natalie is a Freelance SEO and Growth Marketing Consultant, having worked both in house and agency side over the years. She now helps businesses of a multitude of different sizes to grow through her consultancy.

Categories covered: eCommerce - Other, Digital Marketing, PR, Marketing - Other

Adventure Stories is a product branding agency. They specialise in crafting designs including illustration, typography and copywriting and then produce packaging with print, environmental and digital capabilities in mind. They specialise in brands that are product-led and work with a number of FMCG clients.

Categories covered: Product Branding

And Rising is a b-corp marketing and branding agency that builds and executes digital marketing campaigns for brands. They use a blend of different marketing channels to achieve results: display, social (both paid and organic), geotargeted activations.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing,Social Media,Product Branding

Barrows is a design and activation agency helping brands to cut through to their brand identity (logo, colour, tone of voice, style). They also connect consumers to brands through experiential marketing (sampling, trade shows, activations, POS). They have an in-house staffing team and event production capabilities.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Market Research, Digital Marketing, Social Media, Active Sales Support, Design

Fifty helps marketers direct their attention in the right place. The Fifty Audience Platform is capable of producing deep analysis and audience insight into any audience at scale. This data is presented in a dynamic and clear way, empowering marketers to make better decisions with regards to strategy, creative messaging and targeting.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing, Market Research, Category Advisory, Data Purchasing

Flavor Sampling is a specialist sampling agency. They can manage a variety of different techniques and campaign types to deliver optimal results for every campaign. They look after all sampling elements under one roof to drive efficiencies in targeting, relevance, measurement and ROI.

Categories covered: Market Research, Field Compliance, Active Sales Support, Marketing - Other, Sampling

Frontline Growth specialises in scaling early and mid-stage tech startups with growth marketing, with a focus on paid media strategies

Categories covered: Digital Marketing, Marketing- Other

Mairi is a freelance designer working on brand creation, packaging design, campaigns, print and digital marketing material. She specialises in FMCG, DTC and subscription. She manages projects all the way from concept through to design and artworking. She is skilled in Adobe Suite as well as drawing and calligraphy.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Design

Mechanised is a Digital Marketing agency that works alongside your business to drive growth online. They specialise in building eCommerce (Shopify) stores, SEO, Google Ads and Facebook/Instagram adverts.

Categories covered: Web Design, eCommerce - Other, Digital Marketing, Social Media

Natalie is a Freelance SEO and Growth Marketing Consultant, having worked both in house and agency side over the years. She now helps businesses of a multitude of different sizes to grow through her consultancy.

Categories covered: eCommerce - Other, Digital Marketing, PR, Marketing - Other

Oliver Bridge is a specialist digital marketing consultant. Having founded and scaled his own D2C business to sell many millions of units, he has exited to focus on supporting other brands. He can help on an ad hoc strategy basis, or ongoing.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing, eCommerce - Other

Palm PR is a specialist food and drink communications agency specialising in innovative and disruptive brands. They combine Public Relations, Social Media and Digital Advertising into a single integrated strategy.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing,PR,Social Media,Product Branding

Publish Lab is an independent small PR agency known to deliver successful brand campaigns, from start-ups to household names. They enjoy bringing their experience in the food, drink, lifestyle and charity sectors to clients in a much more personalised, yet affordable manner.

Categories covered: PR

Rachel Brunning is a freelance designer with many years experience working with FMCG brands. She is fantastic when it comes to packaging, print materials and everyday design needs. She can work on individual branding projects or ongoing requirements.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Design

Spin Brands are a pure-play social media agency. They focus on a suite of services within social encompassing: Organic Social, Paid Social, Ambassador Marketing, Strategy and Design. They are listed as a Premium Facebook marketing partner, TikTok and Snapchat partners and have an in-house design studio and influencers.

Categories covered: Digital Marketing, Social Media, Design, Marketing- Other

Storm is a PR agency working in trade and consumer PR. Their core services include product placement, news generation, content creation, influencer marketing, community management, trade marketing, thought-leadership and reputation management. They have social media and influencer marketing expertise.

Categories covered: PR, Social Media

CBROS is a full service creative studio, executing creative across brand identity and packaging, branded content, digital marketing, PR and UI/UX design. They can run one off branding exercises or manage your marketing day to day, or both. They specialise in brands that are story-led and work with a number of FMCG challengers.

Categories covered: Product Branding, PR, Digital Marketing, Design, Social Media, Market Research, Marketing - Other

Contact: [email protected] / [email protected] - for brand requests

David Henson is The Slide Presentation Man. If you want visual presentations that are engaging, empowering and effective, David can design and produce your presentations or train you and your staff to do so.

Categories covered: Design, Training

The Social Sequence is a digital marketing agency specialising in social media strategies for small businesses. They provide 1:1 training on paid and organic Instagram and Facebook as well as running audits of social media accounts. You can also outsource the full running of your social media to them, covering paid social and content marketing.

Categories covered: Social Media, Digital Marketing

Wave is an experiential marketing agency that work with brands either conceptually or practically to deliver engaging real life experiences with customers. Among their services is sampling & in-field activations, store compliance and merchandising Visits, staffing & the provision of brand ambassadors, mystery shopping and more.

Categories covered: Market Research, Field Compliance, Active Sales Support, Marketing - Other, Sampling

Rock Soup Media help brands build awareness by accessing big brand sized ad campaigns for a fraction of their normal cost. Whether you are looking for placement on the underground, buses, or big billboard campaigns, Rock Soup can get the best coverage for the best rates.

Categories covered: Product Branding, Marketing - Other

YF's supply chain team support brands on projects to deliver growth, profitability, efficiency or service level improvements. Our supply chain team can support on anything from factory searches, to systems reviews, to 3PL changes, to NPD management and much more.

Categories covered: Advisory and Support, Manufacturing Projects, Brexit Support, Logistics Projects

WFL provides FMCG supply chain solutions. They have trading accounts with all major UK and EU retailers, food service, wholesale, on trade, cash & carry, and health food customers giving immediate full market access to their clients.

Categories covered: Advisory and Support

YF provides quick turnaround label checks to ensure your compliance against UK legislation. We can check for health claims, marketing claims, nutritional information and more. You can purchase label checks directly on the website.

Categories covered: Label Compliance Checks

Ella's career began working for Jordans, Dorset, Ryvita as the Nutrition & Regulatory advisor; she then moved onto Huel where she lead the development of numerous product types, from bars, to cereals, powders to savoury meals.

She is now an independent consultant to the food industry - she specialises in helping start-ups with their wholesome, natural, nutrition- and sustainability- focused food & drink brands, all the way from concept to launch.​

Categories covered: Label Compliance Checks, Technical Consultancy, Heath Claim Queries, New Product Development, Product - Other

Fiona is a highly experienced NPD and quality management specialist, supporting brands in everything to do with product. Through a combination of staff training and practical advice & support, Fiona has assisted the effective implementation advanced NPD, technical and quality management systems into a number of businesses.

Categories covered: Label Compliance Checks, Technical Consultancy, Health Claim Queries, New Product Development, Product - Other

GS1 UK is the UK's arm of the global barcoding body. They are the go-to people to buy your barcodes from (do not buy from anywhere else!) and also have solutions to support brands in the handling and management of their product data. As a partner of YF, they support SMEs in a number of ways and so we recommend becoming a member.

Categories covered: Barcodes, Events, Networking

Johnny is an NPD expert with a PhD in materials science and a deep understanding of current and future food and drink trends. He can support brands with tastings, flavour development, product stability considerations (pH, additives, stablisers, microbiological considerations) and production logistics. Johnny specialises in drinks and fermentation.

Categories covered: New Product Development, Health Claim Queries

Having worked in the food industry for 10 years, as technical manager at Pret and Wagamama, Lara has worked across all categories and production stages. She advises businesses on range planning, recipe development, supplier management (safety standards, quality systems, certifications), operations and compliance.

Categories covered: Label Compliance Checks, Technical Consultancy, Health Claim Queries, New Product Development, Product - Other

Liz has worked in product development for over 20 years. She has a deep knowledge of all aspects of the product development process, from ordering ingredients and logistics to the technical elements and product specs. Her experience lies in cereals, bakery, bars and chilled food. She prefers not to work with drinks.

Categories covered: Technical Consultancy, Health Claim Queries, New Product Development, Product - Other

Nali consulting offers technical services to SMEs and start-ups within FMCG. They assist with formulation, quality control and assurance, and packaging. They hand-hold through the innovation process to ensure the client has a successful and smooth product launch.

Categories covered: Sustainable Packaging, Technical Consultancy, Health Claim Queries, New Product Development

Sarah draws on 20 years of product development experience to help founders bring their ideas to life. Her career started in concept discovery at M&S and led her to head up the Ella’s Kitchen product development and project management team. She now helps challenger brands with everything from recipe development to training and coaching.

Categories covered: Health Claim Queries, New Product Development, Product - Other

Contact: [email protected]

Talking Heads have vast experience of providing translation services to food and drink brands. They translate labels to be locally compliant, ensure brand voice is retained across languages, launch international websites and localise content.#

Categories covered: Label Compliance Checks, Packaging Translation, Legal