Role at BIOVIT
Robin advises the BIOVIT board on food manufacturing, healthy-snacking category strategy, and new product development across functional formats - areas where BIOVIT’s natural vitamins and minerals are increasingly used. His experience scaling a Welsh start-up into a multi-million-pound business sits squarely behind BIOVIT’s ambition to deliver BETTER FOOD FOR ALL.
Background
After thirteen years in the snack bar sector - including a tenure as Chief Executive of Halo Foods - Robin founded Brighter Foods in April 2014, reopening the former Halo manufacturing site in Tywyn, Gwynedd. Backed by the Welsh Government and a small group of private investors, he set out to build a healthy snacking manufacturer focused on niche and growth categories: gluten-free, lactose-free, low or no-added-sugar, sports nutrition, organic, and fair-trade snack bars.
Brighter Foods delivered £10 million in its first full year of trading and grew rapidly from there. The business produced bespoke snack bars for partner brands as well as its own brands, including Wild Trail, stocked in the UK multiples and health food retailers. It won the Welsh Government Business Start-Up award and grew to around 170 full-time staff at its Tywyn manufacturing site.
In 2017, Real Good Food acquired a majority stake in the business for up to £9 million, with Robin remaining as Chief Executive. In April 2021, THG (The Hut Group) acquired Brighter Foods for £43 million, making it a cornerstone of THG Nutrition’s vertically integrated snack and supplement strategy.
Expertise
Founding and scaling a healthy food manufacturing business; bespoke snack bar NPD and formulation; building manufacturing capacity from a standing start; partner-brand and own-brand strategy; UK supermarket distribution in healthy snacking; sports nutrition, free-from, and functional categories; exit to private equity and strategic acquirers.