John Harvey
Co-founder & Chairman
Co-founder and Chairman of The Keswick Group, John started his career in 1957 as a graduate trainee with Unilever - where he worked in various transport and logistics functions. In 1968 he was responsible for the original Unilever investment in Tibbett & Britten, and, in 1984, when Chairman of SPD, he led the management buy-out of Tibbett & Britten from Unilever and Van Gend & Loos (the Dutch railway company) and its subsequent global development across 34 countries. He led Tibbett & Britten Group through the London Stock Exchange listing in 1986 up to its sale to Exel plc in a £328 million deal in 2004 - winning a Queen's Award for Export Achievement along the way.
John was also Chairman of international freight forwarder Unique Logistics from 1992 to 2005. From 2000 to 2005 he was a Defra Advisor, and he has also been non-executive director of Dawsongroup plc, Sygen plc, New Covent Garden Market and the Institute of Grocery Distribution (IGD). He was a Vice President of the Chartered Institute of Logistics & Transport and a former Chairman of both the Cranfield Centre for Logistics & Transport and the international transport charity Transaid, for which he remains an ambassador. His prime function is strategy - joining up dots and fielding loose balls.
Geoff Gillo
Co-founder & Director
Geoff co-founded The Keswick Group with John Harvey in 2004. As well as heading the Group Finance function, he has undertaken a number of non-Executive roles in the logistics, freight forwarding and more recently e-commerce sectors.
A Director of The Keswick Group, Geoff is an internationally experienced financial and commercial executive, with extensive knowledge of line operations, acquisitions, joint ventures and disposals in multi-cultural environments. He is also a Liveryman in the City of London.
A qualified accountant, Geoff started his career with Peat Marwick Mitchell (now KPMG) in 1970, gaining experience at all levels over a full range of accounting and audit services for large, multinational and smaller clients. In 1977 he became Group Financial Controller and Company Secretary for member companies in the United Transport Company (UTC) group. In 1984 he joined Thomas Borthwick & Sons plc, and between 1986 and 1991 was Finance Director of Vestey Group subsidiaries British Beef and Dewhursts. In 1991 he became Finance Director of Axial Group (acquired by Tibbett & Britten Group in 1992) and was then promoted to Finance/Commercial Director of Tibbett & Britten Europe - a role he held until the company's sale to Exel in 2004.
Mike Wallis
Director
Mike Wallis has been a Director of The Keswick Group since 2005 and Executive Chairman of its Spatial Global subsidiary since 2015. He was also a partner in Keswick joint venture Polish logistics consultancy, Graphene Partners until 2021.
A hands-on manager, Mike has a degree in Law and significant experience in the worlds of freight and logistics. This started in 1980 when he joined the Tibbett & Britten graduate scheme at the Hackney depot. In a 25-year career with Tibbett & Britten he gained domestic and international experience across many market sectors - including fashion and textiles, retail grocery, ambient and temperature-controlled food, drink, DIY, FMCG and other consumer durables.
Mike has worked in freight forwarding, contract logistics, warehousing and transport - mostly as the head of business units in the UK, Germany and South Africa. Clients have included companies such as Walmart, Marks and Spencer, Sainsbury's, Unilever, Woolworth's South Africa, Coles Myers Australia, B&Q and Whitbread. His roles at Tibbett & Britten included Retail Director UK, Development Director SA, and Global Retail Strategy Director.
Mike's focus on Spatial Global in recent years has seen the company expand and move into e-commerce. At Graphene Partners (and Keswick Management Services), he also led some of the transformation projects underway in Central and Eastern Europe.
Gavin Withers
Director
A CIMA (Chartered Institute of Management Accountants) qualified accountant, Gavin has lived and worked in the UK, France and Holland. A Director of The Keswick Group since 2006, he started his career as a Unilever graduate trainee in 1986, gaining experience at Van Den Bergh Foods in the UK, and Unilever Raw Materials in The Netherlands. On leaving Unilever he was appointed Finance Director of Tibbett & Britten France in 1995, becoming Finance Director of Axial Europe in 2000, and then Finance Director of Tibbett & Britten Mainland Europe until 2004. Just prior to Tibbett & Britten's sale to Exel in that year, he became Finance Director of Napier Brown Foods; then, after joining Keswick, he was Finance Director of Delamode Group (in which Keswick had a 28% stake) from 2006 to 2010.
Gavin was the Chairman of Tibbett Logistics SRL in Romania until its sale at the end of 2017. He currently has responsibility for the Group's co-packing activities (SGL Co-packing), for the development of Entrad Partners, plus other early-stage Group businesses.
Stuart Ross
Director
Stuart Ross has been a Director of the Keswick Group since 2023, having joined in 2022. He has been Chairman of FSW from the outset and has also served on a number of other Keswick Group Company Boards.
Stuart has extensive experience in the worlds of Logistics, Supply Chain and Retail. He has previously worked for Tesco as Supply Chain and Distribution Director, at T&S Stores plc as Group Supply Chain Director and Exel (now DHL) Europe as Managing Director. Earlier in his career, Stuart worked for Unilever in supply chain roles within the Birds Eye Walls business. Senior supply chain roles followed at Whitbread, Hays Distribution and Iceland Foods.
His career has embraced a broad range of activities with an emphasis on business transformation and change management in challenging environments. Recent experience has focused on turnaround projects along with advisory and consultancy roles both internationally and in the UK.
Stuart has had a particular focus on supporting Keswick's retail relationships since joining the Group, primarily through FSW but also across other Group businesses. He has supported customers through significant periods of change in their businesses and additionally with a number of new product launches.