rich and the dragon, part 2

Last night on BBC2, our Rich was put through his paces by Peter Jones, the dragon with the stripiest socks we've ever seen, on Peter's new show: How We Made Our Millions.

If you missed it and would like a nose around Fruit Towers and an insight in to how Rich, Jon and Adam run things (sometimes even with matching wardrobes), take a look on BBC iPlayer here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/b0175q02/

We hope you like it - please do let us know what you think

richard and the dragon

Earlier this year, Rich bravely opened up his heart, soul and office to Peter Jones, the very shrewd (and very tall) dragon, for a brand new show called How We Made Our Millions.

It's all about Peter getting to know entrepreneurs, finding out what makes them tick, what drives them to be successful, and how organised their stationary cupboard really is.

Peter popped in to Fruit Towers to have a nose around, chat to the people who work here, and get a better understanding of why Rich (and Jon and Adam) run things the way they do.

He also brought his camera mates along and you can see Dan's yellow outfit, Rich giving a dragon fashion tips and Peter being a little bit scared of Oli's ankles on Wednesday night at 9pm on BBC2.

And if you've ever wanted to ask Rich a question, just post it our Facebook wall (www.facebook.com/innocent.drinks) as he's going to be answering them all straight after the show.

some things about our new home you might not know

We're really starting to like our new pad. We've got some slightly scary geese for neighbours, we're next to a canal, there's plenty of tea, and we no longer have to lie about living in a tower because we actually do.

All that aside though, there are a few other things which help make it a bit special.

 

Firstly it's a brand new BREEAM 'good' building, which means it has internationally recognised good environmental credentials. The 'good' rating means it's well insulated with good air circulation and energy efficient lighting, among other things.

 

There's also this rather nifty and satisfying lever to pull if you happen to be the last person to leave your floor at night. Pulling this turns off the circuit which powers all our lamps, monitors and phone chargers while leaving everything else (which is on a second circuit) alone. So there's absolutely no danger of it shutting down the servers and all that other essential stuff.

  

Even more exciting is this little light which comes on when the temperature outside is equal to the temperature we want inside, cutting the air conditioning off. The fancy name for it is mixed mode cooling, and when it happens it means it's time to open the windows, check out what the geese are up to and embrace the fresh air. We've also been known to do a little celebratory dance.

 

Then we have this very useful light which will let us know if the world is coming to an end and we need to make a sharp exit. It hasn't come on yet but when it does, we'll be ready.

 

We'll probably head straight for the helipad.

when you're writing a book...

We have a new book coming out soon. It will be introduced properly on this blog and elsewhere shortly, but before it gets to the shops, we just wanted to share a modern day parable.

If you're ever writing a book, and the deadline is looming, and your publisher is rightly asking you when it all might be ready, and the printers are getting impatient, and the boss is getting nervous, and you're wondering if you really have enough time to get everything done, don't fret. Just look at this photo and you will realise that whatever hurdles you must hurdle, whatever mountains you must climb, you can succeed. It will happen if you summon the positive mental strength. Pull the sledge.

our new home

Today the doors opened at Fruit Towers III. We've moved a few miles up the road, from Shepherds Bush to Ladbroke Grove (weirdly, just across the road from our very first office). It was a bit of a wrench, seeing as we'd been in the last place for nearly 11 years.

Thankfully, everyone seems very happy with the new place. It'll take some time getting used to but we already feel like it's ours. Once all of our crates are unpacked and the teabags have been located, we're going to get along just fine.

We're posting our finest instagrammed photos here if you fancy looking at a few more nooks and crannies.

30 minutes with our Rich, on the telly

The other day our Rich had a chap called Matthew following him around along with a camera and sound crew. They let him know they were coming though so he didn't have to take out a restraining order. If you fancy watching 30 minutes of Rich's home life, him sharing a few business tips, telling a couple of old yarns and his monster table tennis smash then click here*. You can also get a first sneak peak of Fruit Towers 3 as an added extra.

*This link is only available on iPlayer until 3:59am Mon 16 Aug 2010, so be quick.

 

new tube

Here's some new stuff we've just found on the youtube vaguely related to us. One's a recreation of the founding moments of our company in the back of a car. The other is a magician who suddenly appeared at Fruit Towers one day. Not by real magic (like when Copperfield made an airplane disappear or Blaine stood on top of the London Eye), he called ahead and came in through the front door like a normal human being.

 

a window on our world

We were kindly pointed to this new page on the internet yesterday by one of our twitter friends, @sithlords. It's a truly marvelous thing that seems to find lots of pictures, videos, twitter things and web pages all to do with innocent, and then put them all into one big page. 

We really like that it's a big mix of stuff we've made and stuff other people have made, along with old stuff and new stuff (pictures of our old bottles from six years ago next to twitter updates from a couple of minutes ago or example). Go and have a nose if you've got a minute.

our new book

We've just written a new book all about innocent.

We say just. We've actually been talking about writing one for the last few years but it took us a bit longer than we anticipated (lots of looking for old photos, trying to remember everything that's happened and what not). 

Anyways, we finished it just after Christmas and it's now available in Waterstone's, Amazon and all the usual places.

In a nutshell, it's the story of our first ten years in business and is a book for anyone who wants to start their own business, bring fresh thinking to their current one or has been told their idea won't work. 

After all, innocent is a business that almost didn't happen (we were turned down by every bank in the land) so we hope by telling our story we can encourage other people to have a go at doing their own thing too.

Even if starting a business isn't on your to do list, the book does a neat job of summing up our first ten years. And there are lots of pictures. Very important. 

You can also watch this little film that the people from Waterstone's made when they came in for a look round.

ten today

Here are those pictures from our tenth birthday lunch that we promised you earlier. The cake was a particular highlight.

We've grown one whole new row of tables since our eighth birthday lunch.

A truly magnificent example of a cake with a carrot on top.

Adam tells the story of that time Rich crashed a grassy van.

Ingredients for a good birthday lunch: flowers, humus, raffle tickets and our new book. In that order.

The cake gets distributed to a kind of orderly queue.

And no party would be complete without an official appearance from the innocent band.