ring the retail industry. George Graham: I have been running Wolf & Badger for nearly 15 years now, having started the platform when I was only 23. I was a consultant at PwC in London before that, which gave me a strong foundation in how to approach business and strategy, but ultimately my short tenure there also made it clear to me that building my own thing was the way I needed to take my career. While I didn’t have any direct background in retail, I drew a lot of inspiration from my grandparents, who were in the home and jewellery business. IR: How did the idea for Wolf & Badger come about? GG: I co-founded the business with my brother Henry. We both recognised that many people we knew in the fashion and design industry had few opportunities to reach an audience effectively and grow their brands, and we wanted to build something that would offer more opportunities for these sorts of smaller brands to develop and grow responsibly and reach new customers. We started doing this through a small store in West London, and eventually grew the business into the global marketplace we are today. IR: In what ways do you believe Wolf & Badger fills a white space in the retail industry? GG: We increasingly see consumers looking to be more conscious in how they shop. The continued pervasive rise of ultra-fast fashion has given many people pause for thought, and we aim to provide an antidote to that in helping customers discover more interesting, unique and individual products that have been made to last and manufactured responsibly by small businesses. In many ways, we just fill a gap that has unfortunately been left behind by local boutiques becoming increasingly few and far between. IR: What have been the biggest highlights and setbacks you’ve experienced in building the business thus far? GG: Retail has its ups and downs. Over the years, we have grown substantially, but not always in a straight line. Trading during the pandemic, for example, was initially incredibly challenging, but ultimately this helped us build a stronger business, which has helped us drive growth in the years since. Recent highlights include expanding to New York with our SoHo store in 2017, and more recently into a store in Los Angeles. Both help support our continued online growth all across the US. IR: What are your top priorities/areas of focus for the brand over the next 12 months?  GG: We continue to focus all our efforts on more effectively helping independent brands reach conscious consumers, particularly in the US. Despite our business continuing to grow robustly in our UK home market, the US is now our largest customer market and is growing rapidly, so we are excited to continue building on that momentum.  To support this, a notable current focus is the launch of our exciting Tastemakers program, helping sustainably minded creators curate edits of their favourite independent brands from our platform. IR: What are your long-term goals for the brand? GG: Our mission is to make retail fair. Our long-term goal has remained the same throughout the last decade and a half since we started, which is to help independent ethical brands connect with conscious consumers. We keep building on our foundation as now the world’s leading platform for independent brands and over the coming years our plan remains simple: help more brands connect with even more consumers, and provide them with a new and exciting way to shop responsibly. IR: Since launching the company back in 2010, what changes have you witnessed within the retail industry? What shifts do you wish to see in the industry moving forward? GG: It has been a shame to see department stores playing it increasingly safe in terms of the brands they carry, and for local boutiques to have become increasingly rare. More recently, even many of the more innovative and exciting online retailers have disappeared. All this has unfortunately made the retail environment increasingly homogenous and boring. Meanwhile, we are also seeing a rise in ultra-fast fashion and its increasingly negative impact on people and the planet. We hope to see these things change for the better in the coming years, and we will continue to play our role in helping by promoting more exciting and responsibly produced collections and the incredible designer-led brands behind them. IR: What is your approach to work/life balance? GG: With so much more to do, I think it is difficult to find as healthy a balance as I might like, but I enjoy my work and I do find time to pursue other hobbies and interests on the side as much as I can. IR: What is a piece of advice you wish you would have been able to give to yourself when you were at the beginning of your business journey? GG: Stick to your knitting. Over the years, I increasingly appreciate the importance of staying focused. Together with a good dose of hard work and plenty of resilience, it’s just about all you need to succeed eventually.