From Childhood Bee Fears to Britain's Fastest-Growing Honey Brand: Meet the Man Behind Just Bee Honey

What do you get when a child who was terrified of bees grows up to build one of the UK's fastest-growing wellness brands? In Joe Harper's case, it's a business that's redefining how we think about honey.

Founded alongside co-founder Andy, Just Bee Honey has gone from blending jars of honey in a home kitchen during lockdown to being recognised in The Sunday Times 100 as one of Britain's fastest-growing companies. Along the way, the brand has weathered Dragons' Den, survived the pandemic, pivoted its entire business model and helped plant more than 200 million wildflowers across the UK.

We caught up with Joe to chat about family beekeeping, bouncing back from setbacks, why supporting pollinators is at the heart of the business, and the advice he'd give anyone dreaming of starting their own venture.

Your family has been keeping bees for three generations, but you've said you were actually scared of bees as a child. How did you go from avoiding them to building one of the UK's fastest-growing wellness brands?

It's a bit of a family joke, because my grandad kept bees in Northern Ireland and my dad kept them in the family home in Lancashire, and I was the one who wanted nothing to do with them. I got stung so many times as a kid that for years I didn't even like honey.

What pulled me back wasn't the bees, it was the idea. Andy, my co-founder, and I wanted to build something around health and wellbeing, and honey turned out to be the perfect base for it. So I came at it from completely the opposite direction to most people in this world. I didn't start as a beekeeper who fell in love with honey, I started as someone who was slightly terrified of it and grew to see what it could do. Three generations on, the bees have well and truly won me over.

Just Bee has had its fair share of challenges, from turning down an offer on Dragons' Den to seeing your drinks business almost disappear during the pandemic. Looking back, what was the biggest lesson those moments taught you?

That being willing to change your mind is worth more than being right at the start.

Our first business was honey-sweetened drinks, and for five years we pushed at it. We had listings, press and even a Dragons' Den offer, and we sold over a million drinks, but it never quite worked commercially. Then COVID took around 80% of our revenue almost overnight. That forced the decision we probably should have made sooner, which was to accept the original idea wasn't working and reinvent the whole thing around wellness honey.

It wasn't a comfortable moment. We had seven angel investors, not everyone agreed, and it came down to a board vote we won by the narrowest margin. But it saved the company. The lesson I keep coming back to is that persistence only counts for something if you pair it with the honesty to admit when something isn't working.

You've recently been recognised in The Sunday Times 100. What does that achievement mean to you, especially considering the business started by blending honey in your own kitchen during lockdown?

It means a lot, mostly because of where it started. We were blending honey at home during lockdown, not knowing if the business would survive the year, and we ended up turning an abandoned office in Manchester into a makeshift honey factory just to keep up with orders.

To go from that to being named in The Sunday Times 100 Fastest Growing Companies is a proper full-circle moment. But the recognition I care about most isn't really the list, it's the fact that over 450,000 people have chosen to make us part of their daily routine. The award is lovely, but that's the number that keeps me going.

Alongside building the business, you've made supporting bees and biodiversity part of your mission. Why has it been so important for Just Bee to give back to the environment as it grows?

It would feel strange to build a business on honey and not look after the bees that make it possible. Pollinators are under real pressure, and they matter far beyond our little world, since so much of what we eat depends on them.

So from day one we've included a free packet of bee-friendly wildflower seeds with every order, and that's helped plant over 200 million wildflowers across the UK. The thing I like about it is that it isn't a marketing campaign bolted on the side, it's built into how the business runs, and our customers are the ones actually doing the planting. As we grow, that impact grows with us, which feels like the right way round.

For anyone thinking about starting their own business, what advice would you give after experiencing both the setbacks and the successes that have shaped Just Bee's journey?

Be stubborn about the goal and flexible about how you get there. We were absolutely certain we wanted to build a health business, but we were wrong about the first version of it, and clinging to that for too long nearly cost us everything. The moment we let go of the specific idea and listened to what people actually wanted, everything changed.