Marketing Executive
Gibsons Food

Emma H

00:00:02 It’s Emma H and I’m marketing executive here at Gibson’s Foods. My job here tends to involve a lot of what’s called category management and to put that in simple terms, it’s about getting data sources; so statistics, reading research reports and analysing that data and really trying to see where that market’s going, find any sort of new product opportunities or specific range opportunities for existing customers.

00:00:34 I didn’t really know what I wanted to do in my career up until the second year of university so that would when I was about 19. Looking back, in retrospect, I see elements of my childhood and think, ‘oh, all the kind of the basis was there to go into marketing’.

00:00:53 When I was about eight years old, I was really, really into reading, particularly like Enid Blyton, you know, the Famous Five novels. So I started collecting my sort of old books I’d had when I was little and mum and dad’s old books, my brother’s old books and started a bookstall on the lawn, and kind of a bit like a market trader, heralding the people passing by and encouraging them to by my books. And you know, finding cheap books that I wanted to read and then reselling them on, sometimes even for a profit. So, there was kind of that…certainly that entrepreneurial spirit there when I was very young.

00:01:28 I knew at certainly at GCSE age, I knew that I was more on the arts and humanities side of the fence rather than the maths and science. But yeah, I still didn’t know what career I wanted to go into. I think I was…at that age, I was dabbling with ideas of journalism but I didn’t really want to tie myself down to anything. I didn’t want to kind of close any doors and I suppose it was a way of like delaying the decision to be made which is, you know, a hard one for anyone.

00:02:00 My idea for going into marketing actually came at the end of the first year at university so when I was about 18, 19. I actually needed to get some money as every student does and I was doing some temping work for a company called Spring Skills and it was in the marketing department. And the job was, you know, incredibly boring and gave me a headache every day just staring at a computer doing data input, but it was good in that it gave me an insight into what people did in a marketing department and it sort of really appealed to, to, yeah, what I was all about. And so that was when I decided I’d really like to pursue that career route.

00:02:44 And being at university at the time, it was really good because they had careers support and they had literature where you could check out what companies offered graduate recruitment schemes in marketing. And I was just browsing through those and I came across the company “Bettys and Taylors” of Harrogate, so obviously based in Yorkshire. And they just sounded like a really fun company to work for. It was in the food and drink industry and I guess I’ve always been a bit of a “foody”.

00:03:19 So I just went on their website and found that you could send your CV speculatively and, you know, they would have a look at it for you. And lo and behold they did because I was asked to interview. Got through to second interview and basically had a job lined up before I’d even graduated. So I was one of the lucky ones really.

00:03:41 It’s been really for me growing up I suppose to really examine myself internally and think about what my strengths are and what my weaknesses are and I think that actually really helps kind of place yourself in a job or career that suits you. That’s been a really important process for me. Something that my dad’s encouraged me to do over the years.

00:04:11 Yeah, my career’s very important in my life. I don’t think I could…you know, I would be happy just being a lady that lunches.