Business Support Week (BSW)
What is BSW?
BSW is a week-long programme of 1:1 support and online learning, supporting Better Food Traders members to learn new skills, connect with other traders and get bespoke advice around the business of your sustainable food enterprise.
BFT members can access bespoke, sector-specific support around strategy and business development; operations, logistics and organisational culture; marketing and communications; tech and digitisation; and beyond.
Whether you work on the shop floor, the market garden, the warehouse, the office or the kitchen, Business Support Week will have something for you.
Taking Part & Booking
How can we take part?
Over the week of 26-30 January 2026, Better Food Traders members can access bespoke 1:1 advice, inspirational tutorials and expert support to help your enterprise thrive.Â
There are 3 main ways to take part:
How do we book?
Read through the list of advisers below and have a chat with your team about which best meets your current needs and business challenges. Follow the booking links to view their availability and book a slot.Â
- 20 Nov – Bookings open (1 x 1:1 advice slot per member)
- 10 Dec – Bookings expanded (2 x 1:1 advice slots per member)
- 11 Jan – Deadline to book 1:1 advice slots and share info with your chosen adviser
Workshops are visible below and available to book via Eventbrite. Tutorials will be shared with members via email.Â
1:1 advice
Meet your Business Support Week advisers
Ai-Van Kok
Business Analyst & Facilitator
financial clarity and confident decisions
Meet with Ai-Van for help making sense of your enterprise’s finances. Ai-Van can offer guidance and practical tools to help you and your team assess your finances and make informed choices.
- Simplifying financial documents
- Navigating financial difficulty
- Weaving financial clarity into strategy and teamwork
Whether you’re a community enterprise, sole trader, partnership or limited company, meet with Ai-Van for advice on how to build your confidence to assess your enterprise’s finances and make confident, informed decisions.
Ai-Van Kok is a business analyst and facilitator with a background in financial modelling and treasury. Formerly the Finance and Governance Lead at Leeds Bread Co-op, she has worked across different businesses on their finance, strategy, and decision-making. Hear more on the Punchcard podcast, where Ai-Van shares a method for understanding your finances as a whole.
Fully booked
Aylie cooke
A cooke consulting
developing your retail offer
Shopkeepers, online retailers, bakeries, wholesalers – take a strategic look at your retail offer, from operations to purchasing to merchandising and more.Â
Meet with Aylie for expert strategic advice and guidance on:
- Developing an approach to product ranging, seasonality and merchandising
- Food retail operations
- Purchasing procedures and principles
- Market analysis and considerations for decision making and NPD
- Relationship management & negotiation
Aylie Cooke has extensive experience in purchasing and food retail operations in the natural, organic and mainstream arenas. She works with brands and retailers at the SME level to map out and implement growth plans, develop promotion and marketing strategies, and bolster purchasing and operational delivery.Â
If no slots remain, please join the waitlist.
Keeping things running smoothly
Whether you run a B2B or B2C enterprise, Cathryn can share her knowledge and offer support around how to manage your operations and logistics, including:
- Packing and delivery, from new packing efficiencies to transport logistics (cargo bikes to haulage)
- Assessing produce supply and demand, communicating with growers and customers
- Employee relations; managing teams and nurturing healthy organisational culture
- Building and maintaining solid supplier, customer and partner relationships
- Scaling your enterprise
Cathryn Ruffell is the Operations Manager at Organic North, the largest and longest established wholesalers of organic produce in the North, which supplies wholesale organic produce to local schools, shops, veg box schemes, restaurants, cafes and other businesses across the UK. Organic North are well known for their excellent quality produce, fair prices and the meaningful relationships they hold with their customers and suppliers. Cathryn has over 10 years experience of working at Organic North and on a day-to-day level is responsible for managing and overseeing the staff team, vehicle logistics, customer service, and liaising with growers to ensure a good balance of supply across the product range.
Fully booked
Updating your digital tools and systems
Want to take review the digital technologies that underpin your enterprise, assess whether they’re working for you and decide on next steps to make improvements?
Ella can offer mentorship around changing the way you work through digital tools and systems. She can help you choose tech that aligns with your values and ambitions. This might be especially useful for times when you need to scale or transition. Book a meeting with Ella for help with:
- Business analysis
- Developing digital systems that help you scale efficiently and effectively
- Choosing technology that aligns with your values
- Automation for independent food traders, e.g. introducing reliable stock control, ordering, reporting and analysis for your enterprise
- Cost/benefit approaches to improving warehousing and other logistics
- Communicating and navigating change with your customers, team and community
Ella is a Director at Beanies Wholefoods in Sheffield. Ella led a full-scale digitisation process over the last 3-years at Beanies, which has had demonstrable financial impact. She has built systems that enable clear analysis and reporting, created new jobs and developed governance and structures to protect and empower the workforce. Ella is also a Soil Association Organic Ambassador for 2025.Â
Fully booked
Aligning economics with regenerative enterprise
Aligning the head, heart and hands of regenerative economics for successful food/farming enterprises.
Meet with Hamish for support on how to optimise business & growing systems in a holistic context. Areas of expertise:
1. Financial tools & optimising decision making
2. Business planning
3. Crowdfunding and collective funding models
Hamish is a regenerative farmer, designer and practitioner living in Somerset, UK. Hamish founded Middle Ground Growers and EarthCare, which offers design, consultancy and implementation services for the regenerative shifts in agriculture, business and society. Hamish can work with you to support your farming enterprise, from visioning (the Heart), to planning (the Head) and implementation (the Hands).
If no slots remain, please join the waitlist.
Using data in your decision making, marketing and comms
Data and analytics are important tools for helping people find and engage with your enterprise. Get technical support around how to use data to inform your decisions on marketing and community engagement so that you can grow your audience. Jasmine can help you make sure the data you’re collecting is understood, useful and compliant.
Book a meeting with Jasmine for support and guidance on:
- Technical Support around Web Design & Digital Marketing
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
- UX Research
- Data Reporting
- Setting up/managing web and data analytics
- Data analysis
Jasmine is a technical web analyst specialising in both quantitative and qualitative analysis of websites and other digital channels through data, user insights and UX design analysis. She also specialises in technical setup and support for tracking tools such as Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager, as well as the technical and strategic aspects of SEO (search engine optimisation) for growing online audiences.Â
If no slots remain, please join the waitlist.
Mallika Basu
Strategic Advisor, Author & Broadcaster
Communications and commercial strategy for impact and growthÂ
Enterprise leaders and those with strategic responsibility – meet with Mallika for communications and commercial strategy advice, for the times when you need to change direction, pivot or evolve your food enterprise. Mallika can offer advice around how to drive commercial growth and make an impact, whilst communicating in a way that makes an emotional connection, protects reputation and builds trust.
Mallika’s areas of expertise are:
- Developing your brand
- Storytelling
- New business venture/services/products
- Culture and diversity
- Reputation management
Mallika Basu is a strategic adviser, author and broadcaster with over two decades of experience. A former spice brand owner, she blends commercial insight, cultural intelligence and a multidisciplinary approach to help food and drink businesses grow with purpose and impact. Her clients have included Borough Market, Waitrose and NFU Education, and she writes regular features for Good Food, Britain’s largest circulating consumer food magazine. Through her media platforms — including her In Good Taste newsletter, podcast and book — Mallika joins the dots between food, people and planet.
Fully booked
Creative ways to build your market presence
Guidance on developing your enterprise’s image, from advice on branding strategy, to practical advice on web design, content creation, social media and digital assets.
Meet with Shanley for practical support and advice on:
- Branding & Visuals: Strengthening your visual identity through logo design, typography, colour palettes, and brand guidelines.
- Content Development: Creating compelling stories across copy, newsletters, blogs, and campaign materials.
- Social Media & Marketing: Building tailored strategies to grow their online presence and connect with your communities effectively.
- Digital Assets: How to develop photography, videos, graphics, and templates to support consistent, professional communications.
- Web Design: Advising on structure, user journey, copy integration, and accessibility to strengthen your online presence.
- Communications Strategy: Mapping out how you can stay in touch with your community and tell your story.
The Nest is a non-profit creative and marketing agency in service to the regenerative movement. They work to accelerate the transition to a regenerative food and farming system, supporting farmers, producers and ethical businesses to thrive. Their work specifically responds to the challenges agro-ecological and nature friendly farmers face in competition with massive food-business marketing budgets and artificially low priced food.
Shanley Mitchell is The Nest’s Creative & Marketing Lead.
Fully booked
Understanding your customers and building meaningful engagement
With extensive marketing know-how and hands on experience of running a community farm, Tom can advise on how to better understand your customers, engage them meaningfully, improve your brand recognition and effectively share your story. Having recently launched a successful crowdfunding campaign, he can also guide you through community fundraising and how to set up for success.
Book a meeting with Tom for:
- Marketing and communications
- BrandingÂ
- Customer research
- CrowdfundingÂ
Tom Richardson is Co-Managing Director at The Community Farm, an organic veg box scheme outside Bristol with a strong focus on community engagement. Previously Head of Marketing at the Sustainable Restaurant Association, Tom has also worked with Bristol Food Network and sustainability consultancy, Futerra. He has also advised different industries on communicating about food, farming and climate change. Tom also serves as a Non-Executive Director at Better Food Traders.Â
If no slots remain, please join the waitlist.
B2B Sales and procurement
- Making connections with the right people
- Creating a sales packÂ
- Thinking about logistics
- Working with your Local Authority
- Contracts and frameworksÂ
If no slots remain, please join the waitlist.
workshops
COLLABorating & Stacking: Alternative models for better food trading
In this interactive 2-hour talk and workshop, Kimberley Bell, baker and founder, will explore how non conventional business models can help you find both joy and a good salary when producing and trading good food in and for a community.
Communicating food as a force for good
In this interactive 1.5-hour talk and workshop, Mallika Basu will unpack why food stories matter, what makes them resonate, and how to speak about sustainability, ethics and culture in relatable, compelling ways.
BFT WINter gathering
tutorials
Access
Better Food Traders are committed to making our events and activities as accessible as possible. This includes physical access, as well as access in terms of neurodiversity, language, chronic illness, gender, class, race and other ways we engage with the world. If there is any reason you feel these sessions may not be accessible for you, we hope that you’ll let us know and we will do our best to make the changes necessary to enable you to participate. Contact Melissa (Membership Manager) on melissa@betterfoodtraders.org.
See you there!
Not a BFT member?
Better Food Traders is a non-profit organisation that exists to support small and medium-sized enterprises who are aligned with our mission: To rebuild our food system and create thriving local food economies that protect nature, climate, farmers and communities.
We are a UK-wide network for traders including shops, bakeries, online sellers, food hubs, wholesalers, markets, market stalls and veg box schemes, who all sell organically-grown produce and do business in a fair, sustainable way.
Since 2025, our network is supported by an affordable membership model with tiers that reflect individual trader turnover. Our core work is also supported through charitable grants, donations and advisory work.