Nicola is the Head of Marketing for UK and Ireland at Tony’s Chocolonely – the impact company on a mission to eradicate modern slavery and child labour from the chocolate industry. As part of the leadership team that launched the brand in the UK in January 2019, Nicola has been instrumental in the company growing revenue to £20+, category market share to 3.4%, brand awareness to 58% and enabling hundreds of West African cocoa farmers to earn a living income as a result.
Nicola is passionate about marketing and the Tony’s mission; she credits her gut feel and intuition for a lot of her success to date, including being named in the 2022 Marketing Week 100. She wears many hats in this role, including earned and paid media, experiential and the innovation pipeline, and loves the variety and challenge of growing something from scratch. Highlights of the role so far include launching the disruptive Sweet Solutions campaign, sharing the Tony’s story on stage in a Festival of Marketing keynote and Tony’s being the fastest-growing chocolate brand in the UK for the past two years.
Nicola started her career at Diageo on the commercial graduate scheme. She was in sales roles for four years before two years in innovation growing the premix can and cocktail portfolio. Her time at Diageo demonstrated the importance of working for a company that cares about people and development. After 6 years Nicola knew she wanted a new challenge, and to focus solely on a marketing career, so she took a leap into the unknown at healthy drinks start up CocoPro. There’s no better place to cut your marketing teeth than at a boot-strapped start-up with no marketing budget. After two years there Nicola was seeking more purpose and, for a self-confessed chocoholic, the stars aligned when the role at Tony’s Chocolonely came up. She firmly believes that all business should be a force for good and that people and planet don’t have to be sacrificed for profit.
Outside work you can find Nicola exploring the London foodie scene with friends, planning the next holiday adventure or hanging out with her nephews.
