Ahead of the festive season, we’re encouraging everyone to shop small and what better way to do so than with our Gift Guide 2025 edition! With a wide range of members across the UK from sweet hampers to skincare, we’ve got you covered.
In this Member Spotlight series, we’d like to introduce you to the brilliant minds behind the Gift Guide. Meet Jonnie, Founder of Toast’d…
Hi! Can you tell us about your business and why you started?
Toast’d is our small family business which produces fun and unique Marshmallow & S’mores kits for families to enjoy together, or as a fun and unique gift to share with family and friends. Our kits are 100% plastic-free, and they come with everything you need – this includes a re-usable, eco-friendly Marshmallow Toaster to enjoy toasting indoors, outdoors or wherever the adventure takes you!
We produce a variety of kits in differing sizes to suit all types of families and individuals, including those that have a vegan, gluten-free or dairy-free dietary requirement.
As an ex-sales and marketing director with over 25 years of experience in the food industry, I wanted a new challenge and the opportunity to set up and grow my own business. I was inspired by my trip to Camp America many years ago, where I tried my first toasted marshmallow and s’more around the campfire. Since then, we always toasted marshmallows and made s’mores on family holidays with our kids.
I made the decision in 2019 to start Toast’d after a road trip through California where I experienced first hand again families enjoying Marshmallow Toasting & S’mores, camping at Yosemite and on the beaches of Santa Barbara & Santa Monica and that was the Eureka moment and Toast’d was born!
Fast forward 5 years, our family business – which includes my daughter, sister-in-law, and two aunts – has become the leading brand of s’mores kits for families, and we’re enjoying growth of more than +40% year on year.
What makes your product the perfect gift for the holiday season?
All of our kits are enjoyed throughout the year, as a weekend treat with the kids, on camping trips, staycation activities on the beach, as well as for birthday gifts and treats. They’re the perfect gift for the holiday season, as they can be enjoyed with family and friends indoors, outdoors or wherever the adventure takes you!
We also have limited edition, seasonal kits – they include the Christmas Original, S’mores and Hot Chocolate Kits, all with some fun activities to enjoy together.
What do you love most about running your company?
There are lots of things I love about running Toast’d – every day being different, seeing our products enjoyed by customers, or seeing them on sale in garden centres for the first time. My favourite part is probably when we engage with customers and hear their wonderful feedback about how they’ve enjoyed using our kits!
We’re also constantly surprised by how creative customers are – for example, using the actual boxes as windbreakers to toast their marshmallows on a beach, or packing kits in hold luggage to use on holiday!
How do you prepare for the festive season, and what advice would you give to other small business owners?
Plan, plan, and plan some more! For most businesses, the festive season provides a huge sales opportunity, and it’s so important to harness and maximise this opportunity. From building stock to time-management and resource planning, planning is crucial for success.
How has Tide helped you to run your business and what has been your favourite feature?
Tide has helped me set up and run Toast’d in a variety of ways! Firstly, the easy-to-use app makes it simpler and quicker to carry out basic actions, such as paying invoices and all the other admin requirements of running a small business
Secondly, the variety of finance options available either directly through Credit Flex or indirectly through partners have been invaluable in achieving our growth to date.
What’s the biggest challenge for your business at the moment?
Scaling the business through bootstrapping rather than external investment. At present, we’re growing through gaining new customers, increasing repeat purchase rates, entering new sectors and developing new products. However, I often think we could achieve much more rapid growth through external investment.
Lastly, what’s one tip you would give to people who want to start their own business?
I think it’s crucial to go above and beyond the standard research most small businesses conduct before jumping into the launch phase. I would recommend:
Find your niche: try to identify a true niche within your chosen sector, product range or customer group. If you can’t find one, then try positioning your product or service in a unique and fun way that creates some distance between you and competitors
Usage occasion: identify potential scalable growth opportunities extending from your core idea. For example, is the product or service for personal use? Could it also be turned into a gifted proposition?
New sectors: will the product or service operate in a single sector?
For Toast’d, I wanted to enter a sector that wasn’t saturated, had potential to scale but in more than one sector, and had a variety of usage occasions that could be maximised throughout the year and not just during seasonal spikes. I also wanted to create a brand that was fun, unique, multi-use and multi-category to provide good growth opportunities as we scale.
