“I was brought up by Dorset’s number one Eco-Warrior, Theresa McManus, so I have been supporting environmental causes since the ’80s, way before it was fashionable! And because of that, protecting the planet to me is a no-brainer, the organic apple hasn't fallen far from the tree. What I discovered as I started growing up was my passion for humanitarian issues as well as environmental - the way I see it, we’re all part of the same ecosystem.

In my twenties, I moved back home to work in PR after a few years living abroad. The country felt different, Bournemouth felt different. I saw vulnerable people who were not being supported by the state, I saw problems with our pride and joy, the NHS; and crucially for me I thankfully found the Green Party. I ran as a candidate for MP for Bournemouth West for them in 2015. I learnt more about politics in those first months of campaigning than I think I’d have ever learnt at university, and I learnt that I didn’t just care, I really cared.

Politics is however a very frustrating route to change in this country and will continue to be until we have proportional representation. I knew I needed to find another route, and that’s when I applied to study for a Master’s in Green Economy at Bournemouth University.

I've worked in PR for years (and years), and I absolutely love it; I love writing, I love pitching, I love creating campaigns, I love social media, branding, training, events, awards, all of it. Communication is the key to everything. And that’s what PR does, it relates you to your audience.

It was inevitable that these two passions of mine would unite and I would use my expertise to enact change and help transition us into a more sustainable future. Warrior is all about ethical business, treating people and the planet in the right way AND creating a successful business. Business is an ecosystem too."

I really wanted to work in the third sector and was always applying to any jobs I could find in the Dorset area, that was until I had a wake-up call from a recruitment agent who was quite cruel but actually did me a massive favour. The problem was, I didn’t have any paid work experience in the third sector, and he told me how it was ‘you won’t get a job in the third sector unless you move to London’. And I had no plans to move anywhere.

I’d been studying part-time for my degree and then the MSc for the past eight years for the sole purpose of having a ‘meaningful’ job. And now it looked like I’d never been able to get that dream job. And then Covid happened.  

Lockdown gave me the time and space I’d never had to really think about what I wanted to do and I decided the only way I could do what I wanted, in the town that I wanted to do it in, was to invent my own job, and that’s when Warrior was born. I called it Warrior because I wanted us to fight for a better and more sustainable future.