The many sides of our top dog & Koozai Owner, Sophie Roberts!

Being the curious cats we are, we had a good ol’ chinwag with our top dog & Koozai owner, Sophie Roberts. Here’s what we learned…

Where did you grow up? I grew up on the sunny south coast – I had a really happy childhood, played out a lot with friends, did a lot of sport, & generally spent most summers on the beach.

What was your first job?

A paper round! But it interfered with my sports cubs/evenings on the beach so I changed to doing weekends, but the supplements were so heavy I couldn’t carry them on my bike – so my dad used to drive me – haha!

What next?

After uni, I dove straight into PR as a freelancer. I told myself I didn’t just want to be making tea & doing press cuttings – back in the olden days it was actually cutting out the article & measuring it, sticking in a document. I worked on some cool brands like Wotsits, Airfix & Humbrol & Victorinox. My favourite campaign was one aimed at students & was called “How Long is Your Wotsit?” You can imagine the fun we had with that.

I then went off travelling to Asia, Australia, New Zealand, the Pacific Islands & the US.

I moved into the hospitality sector & won a Catey [the industry Oscar] for best Independent Marketing Campaign for the work I did on the Service! TV programme which aired on the BBC. My campaign got so much traffic, new members & interest in front-of-house professions – it worked better than even I had believed it could.

When did Koozai come into the picture?

At the same time I was pregnant & moved out of London. As luck would have it, a local digital marketing agency – Koozai – was looking for a Client Services Manager. During my first interview I met Ben, Koozai’s founder; we got on from the get-go & I felt like part of the family straight away. I progressed through the business until one day Ben asked if I’d like the role of MD. He reminded me that when he’d interviewed me all those years ago, I said my ambition was to “have his job”. Well. What was I supposed to say to that? There have been some challenging times but overall I loved working for Ben & Koozai. The pandemic hit us & that’s when I decided I’d buy into the business. I believed in us & I knew we’d be able to ride out the storm & here we are!

Any favourite Koozai memories?

Some of my favourites are the clients we’ve done awesome work for – winning awards for Travelbag & Papa Johns for example. But also what we do together as a team. Seeing people get married, have kids & grow as people. I love all that. I know it’s cheesy, but I do love my koozfam.

Let’s get personal…

I’m a fierce advocate of work-life balance & I hope the team would agree. I adore my family & spend as much time as I can with them (although the small is now a tweenager). I have a slight obsession with organisation. Like ‘The Home Edit’ all my drawers & cupboards have labelled containers & my husband has to drag me away from the Kilner jars aisle regularly.

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