Most founders wait for the right idea. Tessa Clarke spent years doing exactly that before realising she'd been looking for the wrong thing, she should have been looking for a problem she cared about.
Since co-founding Olio in 2015 with Saasha Celestial-One, Tessa has grown the food sharing app to more than 10 million users and an estimated £1.1 billion in social impact, alongside a B2B arm that now redistributes surplus for supermarkets, schools and production companies.
Tessa is also a teacher at the Executive Programme at Future London Academy. Learn from her in-person: https://fla.wiki/4wZMcJ5
In this video, you'll learn:
▶ Why a two-week WhatsApp group proved the concept before a single line of code was written
▶ How Olio's most enthusiastic early users turned out to be the ones with nothing to give, and the third audience she built to close the gap
▶ Why Duolingo's streaks would never work for surplus food, and how to test a borrowed mechanic before you copy it
▶ How signing one supermarket outgrew everything the consumer app could achieve on its own
▶ How to answer a prevention-based question with a promotion-based response, and why female founders get asked them in the first place
▶ Why nobody cares about your solution, only whether you understand their problem
Chapters:
00:00 Meet Tessa Clarke Co-Founder of Olio Solving Food Waste at Scale
04:56 Why Tessa Clarke Chose Business Over Charity
09:41 Why Purpose-Driven Business Attracts Gen Z Talent
14:05 How Olio Started as a WhatsApp Experiment
19:05 The Food Waste Heroes Programme That Solved Olio's Supply Problem
21:34 How B Corp Status Helped People Understand Olio's Business Model
28:37 Why Financial Incentives Backfired for Olio
34:44 How Tessa Clarke Raised $50 Million as a Female Founder
43:32 What Is Earth Overshoot Day
47:00 How Olio Measures Its Social Impact Beyond Profit
50:34 Why Olio Pivoted from B2C to B2B
56:30 How to Pitch Purpose to Corporate Buyers
1:00:25 Tessa Clarke Wants to Replace GDP as Our Success Metric