From teenage tradesman to MBE: Christian McBride’s leadership journey

“I’ve always wanted to make the world a better place – ever since I was a little boy,” says Christian McBride MBE CMgr FCMI, CEO of Amigo Ventures. The pioneering telecoms entrepreneur has helped save millions of phone accessories from landfill and won an MBE for his contribution to business. Leaving school at 17 with a few GCSEs, he had no idea of the impact he would make.  

“I didn't have the opportunity for further education or a clear career path in mind, but my dad was a mechanic, so I started off trying trades like butchery and forestry,” he says. “Then a sales role came up at a local mobile phone distributor. I’d always felt I could sell ice to Eskimos, so my telecoms career started there.”

After outperforming his colleagues for a year and a half, Christian set up the wholesale division of a similar business, learning the skills he’d need to launch his own company, like developing a team and managing a business in its infancy.

Pioneering the circular economy in mobile accessories

Then, in 2005, at just 25 years old, Christian “took a leap of faith” and launched phone accessories distributor Genuine Solutions with his brother and a few friends. The business grew steadily over the first couple of years, throwing up plenty of challenges for the young entrepreneur. 

“Until that point, I’d learned through practical application, but I didn’t have the technical business skills you get from studying,” he says. “Reflecting now, I wish I’d had the tools my CMI qualifications later gave me in the toolbox back then.”

In 2009, Christian spotted a trend that ignited his boyhood dream of changing the world for the better. Mobile network operators shipping phones to the Far East were saving on costs by sending just the phone. Everything else in the box was going to landfill and creating huge mountains of waste. “I just thought it was criminal,” says Christian. 

He launched GSUK to recover those products and sell them back into the market. Widely accepted as pioneers of the circular economy movement within the telecoms industry, GSUK has won numerous accolades, including the Queen’s Award for Enterprise.