Last week, I had three conversations that could change Bold Bean Co’s trajectory. A buyer wanted to discuss a new listing opportunity. A potential collaboration partner reached out via LinkedIn. A journalist pitched an interview feature that could put us in front of millions of consumers.
All these opportunities came to me specifically: the founder. And in 12 weeks, I’ll be stepping away from the business for maternity leave – though honestly, even committing to try it feels revolutionary.
Welcome to the founder’s maternity dilemma in food and drink.
Can my business survive without me?
Long before I was pregnant, I asked Richard Reed of Innocent: “How do you feel about a founder going on maternity leave?”
His answer surprised me. He thought it would be the best thing for my business. “If it can’t survive without you for a few months, you don’t have a business.”
In theory, that makes perfect sense. But here’s what makes this terrifying to test in practice: we exist in a relationship-led industry where founders are often the one relationship that sets challenger brands apart from corporates. When I first DM’d a Waitrose buyer two months before launching, my opening line was simple: “Hi, I’m Amelia. I’m on a mission to make people obsessed with beans.”
That personal connection worked. But it also created a dependency that now terrifies me.
Look across the challenger food landscape – from Pip & Nut to PerfectTed – and founders become the face, the story, the shortcut that unlocks doors. They leverage LinkedIn posts to show performance to retailers, use their name to escalate team challenges, and secure coverage that would otherwise go to bigger brands.
But as I begin to contemplate taking myself out of the business, I’ve come to question how dependent we need to be on that individual. We’ve spent years building relationships that go far beyond me. Our buyers now connect directly with Lucy Cowan on commercial strategy and Beth, our beanologist, who shares category data with retailers. Within major retailers, we have champions across marketing, sustainability and ranging teams who believe in Bold Bean Co, not just its founder.
Our performance speaks for itself now too – we’re category-leading on value and have repeat purchase rates that outperform competitors. Where my enthusiasm may have helped to open a door, as we grow, metrics become more important to the decisionmaking processes of buyers, not gut instincts.
Keeping the culture alive
But of course, beyond these relationships there is the founder’s memory bank. Unlike established brands with 1,000 brand guideline documents, much of our institutional knowledge lives in my head. I’m the only one who has lived through all the big decisions – why we changed our name from Humble (yes, that was nearly our name!) to Bold. I know why we chose our Spanish supplier, and understand the nuanced differences between our queen butter bean harvests.
But here’s what I keep forgetting: I’ve hired exceptional people precisely because they’re better at most things than I am. My co-founder Ed has transformed how we operate. Martha, our brand lead, has come to define who we are better than I ever could. The brand has evolved beyond “Amelia’s bean business”. Our recent collaboration with Ottolenghi happened purely because of the brand we’ve built and how we stand for the best of beans – not through any personal connections.
Culture is probably what concerns me most. Ed Perry from Cook once told me something that stuck: “One area you can never stop caring about as a founder is culture.” Half of mine and Ed’s calls focus on exactly this – how our team feel, their connection to our purpose, their motivation levels, what we can do to nurture our culture.
But brilliant cultures exist beyond a single person. We created our values together, and Ed will champion them while I’m away. We’ve invested in Kate Voss as our fractional head of people, ensuring the culture we’ve built continues to thrive.
Of course the funding question looms large. Investors invest in founders, and if cashflow tightens, that responsibility typically falls to me. A negative bank balance doesn’t offer concessions for maternity leave. But I’m planning for this, and hoping this will be very unlikely to happen, and that’s the most I can do at this stage.
Normalising maternity leave for founders
Here’s the real problem: I’ve rarely heard stories about female founders taking proper maternity leave. Research shows having a baby remains a significant career obstacle for women – earnings stagnate and promotions disappear, and it seems the issues extend to women who are their own bosses. I hear about founders breastfeeding during sales pitches, taking “two-week recoveries”. Getting straight back to it.
I hear these stories and my heart sinks. Should I do the same? Despite Bold Bean Co being my everything, a voice forces me to question my commitment, dedication and ambition for the brand if I choose to step back.
But my team is capable, my brand has momentum far beyond me – and that voice is exactly what needs challenging.
So despite these fears, I’m trying to commit to a proper maternity leave. Even trying to do this feels like pushing boundaries in our industry.
I need to practice what I preach. I’ve built Bold Bean Co on values of putting people first and supporting parents. If I don’t take proper leave, what message does that send to every parent on my team or anyone considering starting a family?
This is our ultimate stress test, but also our opportunity. This is an opportunity for me to empower the team to really let them step up and get experience of running a business as a collective. All the work I’ve put in over the past five years has been building toward exactly what Reed recommended: creating something sustainable that doesn’t depend on me being available 24/7.
The industry needs founders who can normalise this. Every maternity journey looks different and being able to take proper leave is itself a privilege. Three years ago, stepping away would have been catastrophic. But I’m not in that position anymore, and with this comes responsibility to normalise it.
Every time a founder takes proper parental leave, we prove it’s possible, and we may just encourage a future generation of female founders who think that running a business is incompatible with parenthood.
The preparation is intense: decision delegation charts, escalation frameworks, months of knowledge transfer. But then again, so was convincing Britain to pay £3.25 for a jar of beans.
If we’ve learned anything at Bold Bean Co, it’s that the impossible just needs someone mad enough to try it.
Amelia Christie-Miller, founder & CEO of Bold Bean Co
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