Robert Stevens

"Alongside my Business course at East Sussex College, I run my own business, Sussex Vegan. I set up the website when I was 17."

It now boasts around 200 registered vegan businesses, including restaurants, cafes, hotels and organic clothing. In October 2018 I organised the first Vegan Festival in Lewes, which hosted over 30 exhibitors and welcomed over 1,000 visitors.

The first vegan dot com billionaire?

I was recently invited to visit Google UK offices in London to take part in a cutting-edge course designed to support small business and individuals with digital skills. The event was sponsored by Evening Standard and Department of International Trade (DIT). It was an excellent opportunity to enrich my learning and business skills. I met Ronan Harris, the Managing Director of Google UK & Ireland and Baroness Rona Fairhead, Minister of State at the Department for International Trade. I took part in a scheduled 1:1 session with a senior marketing expert from Google who helped me review my current business strategy for Sussex Vegan. This was phenomenal and I'd recommend anyone with a great business idea to apply for the Google workshops.

After the success of Vegan Festival Lewes on World Vegan Day I took the festival to Eastbourne with the aim of making it the biggest of its kind.

Over 1,000 visitors came to the College to explore what veganism has to offer in 2019. We had a fantastic line-up of vegan-friendly businesses in the effort to educate and inform.

Global sponsor, VegFund, came on board to support the event, plus vegan activist and VBites founder, Heather Mills. To get this kind of outreach has been amazing.