Self-service entrepreneur Dean Ward is the latest guest on the hit with Jonathan Boyers and Chris Maguire.听
Dean Ward is the co-founder and chief product officer at Wirral-based-Evoke Creative, which can count McDonald鈥檚, JD Sports, Google, Subway and Burger King among its clients.
The game-changing moment for Evoke came in 2015 when it secured听a multi-million order from McDonald鈥檚 that led to 5,000 kiosks 鈥� despite only having 15 staff!
Ward told the podcast鈥檚 hosts Jonathan Boyers and Chris Maguire how the deal came about.
鈥淲e鈥檇 spoken to McDonald鈥檚 two years previously at a show and suddenly this email comes through and it鈥檚 an opportunity of a lifetime,鈥� he said.
鈥淲e were a small company with 15 staff but we decided to go for it. It was the sort of opportunity we were not going to get again.
鈥淲e blew their socks off. We developed the product and brought a lot of efficiencies. We won the deal and we literally doubled in size overnight.鈥�
Their success led them to winning customers all over the world in the retail and hospitality space as staff numbers grew to around 150 and a turnover of 拢35m.
What made their story even more incredible was the company鈥檚 growth was bootstrapped until 2018 when it received the first of two investments from BGF.
BGF initially invested 拢6m in November 2018 听and made a multi-million pound follow-on investment in 2023 following significant contract wins and international growth.
Ward said: 鈥淲e chose BGF because they invest in the management.听 They鈥檙e quite light touch.
鈥淲hen we started working with Subway and Burger King at the same time we either went for it or didn鈥檛 accept the order. We needed working capital to be able to buy the product.鈥�
Boyers is the head of Alvarez & Marsal Corporate Finance team and Maguire is 老九品茶Cloud鈥檚 executive editor.
The Dealmaker Uncut听podcast has been produced by Manchester-based听.
Listen to the Dean Ward podcast