Edinburgh case study - Bigmouthmedia
Steve Leach
Managing Director and co-founder of Bigmouthmedia
In less than ten years Steve Leach turned Bigmouthmedia
from a three man team into Europe's largest digital marketing
agency. The company now has offices in ten countries across the
world and employ over 200 staff.
Is Edinburgh a good place to grow your business? Are there any
ways in which it could be improved to help more start-ups
prosper?
Edinburgh is a great place to grow a business. Where else in the
UK can you find world-class
universities turning out top-notch graduates on your
doorstep, find the quality of
life that we have here and still be only a short plane
journey away from other major cities? We have it good here and I
always find it strange that London is full of Scottish people, why
would they want to leave this part of the world!?
You travel a lot and Bigmouthmedia now have offices in several
cities around the world, are there any cities that you think
Edinburgh can learn from and if so what would they be?
We could start by looking at practically every major city in the
world and following their example by introducing rail links to our
airport. Edinburgh is a great city with a great track record for
innovation, but the
non-existence of a fast, clean link to such an important transport
hub is lamentable.
What is the hardest lesson you have learned as you have built
the company up?
That finding the right employees isn't easy. We have a unique
culture at Bigmouthmedia and it only takes one misguided
apointement to upset the balance. We put a lot of effort into
making sure that we select the right candidate.
How would you assess the potential of Scotland's and
Edinburgh's creative and services sector?
Enormous. There are some incredibly savvy and talented people here and we
have a real opportunity to build a world-class industry in
Scotland. However, that chance is open to competitors from around
the globe and if we want to grab it we are going to have to step up
to the plate and market ourselves both as individual companies and
as a nation.
The creative services sector has played a key role in
rejuvinating Leith as a business area. How would you like to see
Edinburgh's broader waterfront develop?
Bigmouth has been associated with the area since we set up shop
a decade ago and the changes have been both remarkable and welcome.
I'd like to see more of the same steady pace of development.
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