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Veuve Clicquot announces 2023 Bold Woman Award winner
Tessa Clarke, co-founder and CEO of food-sharing app Olio, has been announced as this year’s winner of the Veuve Clicquot Bold Woman Award.
The ceremony, hosted at Veuve Clicquot’s Solaire Culture Exhibition, celebrating the Champagne house’s 250th anniversary, saw Clarke becoming the 51st woman to receive the award, following in the footsteps of previous winners, including Professor Sarah Gilbert, recognised in 2021 for her work leading the development of the University of Oxford’s Covid-19 vaccine, and celebrated architect Dame Zaha Hadid in 2013.
Jean-Marc Gallot, president of Veuve Clicquot, explained what makes a Bold Woman winner: “Nominees are assessed across four key areas, from successfully reinventing traditions and demonstrating entrepreneurial daring, to championing better representation of female leaders and maintaining an ethical approach, and I’m delighted that this year’s winners are pushing boundaries with innovation and their ambition to achieve sustainable and societal impact.”
The judging panel for this edition of the award included the likes of Sian Westerman, co-chair at British Fashion Council Trust, and Naomi Kerbel, former global head of TV and radio at Bloomberg.
Since Olio was launched in 2015, it is estimated that 100 million portions of food have been saved from going to waste by the app. Clarke’s role in connecting 86,000 ‘Food Hero’ volunteers, charged with rescuing and redistributing food, was also cited by the judging panel.
Reacting to her win, Clarke said: “It’s an absolute honour to receive this incredibly prestigious award and I’m truly humbled to be positioned alongside the previous winners. The Bold Woman Award celebrates a daring attitude to business, reinventing tradition and an ethical approach to business, all qualities I greatly admire and try to embody in my work. I started Olio because I wanted to help solve one of the world’s largest problems and it’s great to see this has resonated with so many people. We’ve hit some incredible milestones already, and I hope I can continue to inspire the next generation of game changing, Bold female entrepreneurs.”
The Bold Future Award, which celebrates up and coming female leaders, was given to Karen Scofield Seal, founder and CEO of Oceanium, a company that has pioneered the use of seaweed for food, cosmetics and packaging.
Scofield said: “I’m grateful that our work is being recognised with this prestigious award and that it will highlight the potential that Oceanium has to help shape our future. I’d love to see more female led businesses and I hope I can inspire others to be brave, audacious and follow their passion.”