Local Data Company Celebrates 19th Birthday
Date published: 2022-07-04 Date modified: 2023-08-16
As the Local Data Company celebrates its 19th birthday, our founder and CEO, Barnaby Oswald, shares his thoughts.
happy birthday
A rare moment of reflection (as opposed to the constant voice in my head – ‘onwards, onwards’) – today is Local Data Company's 19th Birthday.
One of the many lessons I have learnt over the past near-two decades is that running a business is a challenge that can never be finished - and to that end the quote from Jimmy Carr’s book (I know) “happiness lies in tasks without end” is spot on. I still thoroughly enjoy the challenge.
I also like the quote from a Hungarian novel (which was quoted to me by the great Gordon Bajnai as opposed to the idea that I regularly read Hungarian novels): “you realise that everything in life that is important started a long time ago”. Amen to that.
In 19 years, we have survived both the Global Financial Crisis as well as a pandemic (which when you consider our core business is physical retail and hospitality was by no means a given).
Today we are a team of 200 people, with my proudest achievement being the culture we have created – a collective of kind, hardworking, talented individuals, who tolerate me ordering tequila when we are out celebrating.
A massive thank you to everyone who has helped us get here – past and present, employees, clients and partners – thank you for your support.
Here is a glimpse of how much more hair I had at the beginning when we started the pre-cursor to LDC... with apologies to Alex Oswald, Toby Robertson and Sam Sykes.
For more about LDC and to see a full timeline of our history click here.
Author
Barnaby Oswald, LDC Co-Founder & Managing Director
The Local Data Company
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Barnaby started his first business in 1998, e-street.com, where as COO he was instrumental in the development of the online classified advertising business, including partnerships with Evening Standard, Microsoft and Visit London. Barnaby co-founded the Local Data Company in 2003 where as Managing Director he has been responsible for the growth of the company from a start-up to an established business with 70 staff. Barnaby is a keen cyclist, having completed the Rapha Manchester to London ride – 350km in a day – in 2015; and the Marmotte Challenge in 2017.