Planet Marmalade looks inside the cupboards, the stores, the warehouse, the clouds and beyond to make that perfect SEO design plan.
With patience, all good things grow organically and prosper. Planet Marmalade’s SEO designs help your website’s products and services, store well, and gain a long shelf life.
If you want your products or services noticed on a web browser, it’s probably a good idea to start with great graphic design, website design & then get your website optimised for the internet. Planet Marmalade’s search engine optimisation (SEO) is designed to work with the search engine Google.
Planet Marmalades SEO design philosophy revolves around instincts and curiosity. A search engine optimisation design project with Planet Marmalade might start with a brainstorming walk or quiet moments in nature, to give space to ponder and pontificate on your dreams and goals.
The result? An SEO design that doesn’t just support your businesses product or services, it stirs and invigorates them, producing batches with long sell-by dates, and marmalade that you and your customers will love for years to come. Jump in and let’s make some magic!
Growing up in Torquay was a privilege, with all the wonders of the leafy sheltered coastline, along with all the pomp of the Victorian age legacy. There was always plenty to do and explore.
I wanted to be a train driver, then an astronaut, I could be anything I wanted to be!
In the early 80s, Torquay’s hospitality business was booming! Back then it was all about wine bars, bistros, and nightclubs and there were plenty of them to choose from.
I worked for the Mathiew Brothers, who then owned the majority of the success stories. By the age of 15, I worked up to an assistant chef. On the head chefs’ day off, I was in left in charge and …
Do you want to hitch down to Greece with me, a friend asks? OK, sounds great, said I! A few weeks later, I was sleeping on the floor in Calais ferry terminal!
With my trilby, 1950 woollen trench coat, rucksack and sleeping bag and not much else, the real world was unrepenting.
Sleeping in corn fields, train station floors and eating cold ravioli …
I was working as a glass collector in a city bar in the Barbican. It was the last night of the current management and it was a big party! The next day we were all sacked! During the night, I was offered a job washing barrels in a microbrewery in the East End of London. Godsons & Chudley brewery was its name, and it was by run by two Irish brothers, Patrick and Finnian Fitzpatrick …
The interview went well, and I was gainfully employed, along with two others, to expand the already successful wine and beer wholesaler Maison Caurette.
Working from a railway arch near London bridge train station, I became a Becks Beer sales person with along with a shiny new Ford Sierra!
They took me on to market and sell the newly imported Beck’s beer to the wines bars in central London …
As a kid we had students for years from all over. Torquay is a popular English language centre and draws international status. Supanit had stayed with us for a year or so, as an opare.
My flight took me to Bangkok, with an intended two-week stop over en route to Australia, along with a years working visa. I was met by Supanit and her Mum at Bangkok International airport.
Sol Beer from Mexico (Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma Brewery) had taken off in London. Yet another true brand!
Consumers had discovered that Sol beer, tasted much better with fresh lime in it. The theatre of a clear glass bottle with its painted lable, golden coloured beer, with fresh lime in the top, was destined for success, especially as it cost more than a pint of beer. These were strange times. It seemed that the more the cost, the better it would sell.
I first came across a computer whilst in Sydney. I befriended two Aussies, one of which used a PC for number crunching, with dreams of taking the risk element of rising and falling stocks. I also read History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russel, and The Ego and the ID by Sigmund Freud; An interesting bunch!
Some years later, Aussie Dave arrived with his UK working visa and lodged with me in London; along with his laptop …
With all this new technology at hand together we created and launched my very own brand, Jackson Root Beer, made by the Three Stetsons Brewing Company, London SE1. The banks chucked money at me, and I was out on my own.
An interesting journey. A root beer you ask, well why not! The product design, packaging, and the merchandising were all created by using Corel Draw …
TNT, the most successful cider ever launched!*
Against the norm, the Round Brothers created a stir in the drinks’ industry in the early nineties, with an evolutionary concept, TNT cider. A new bottle, a new opener and a new sleeving process to name but a few, it was brilliant, good on them!
With a hand made wooden sample, along with my printed Filofax full of hungry contacts, off I went …
My daughter was struggling to get the grips of using a mouse; a grey somewhat boring object with a cable sticking out. Why isn’t there a lady bird mouse available, surely this would make using a computer more engaging and fun I asked!
I phoned my artistic friend Dick to see if he could make me one, he said yes, then our journey into computer aided devices began.
Dick had a contact in the city of …
Then I was thrown into the big school. Back then it was called the Audley Park Secondary School with its notorious A, B, C, & D streams. I was aligned in the D for dunce stream – as I remember, we called it back then. I couldn’t wait to leave. I found gainful employment at the age of 15, working in the numerous bistros and bars dotted about the town. There I learnt to wash up, cook steaks, fish, shellfish and sample all the finer things in life.
I did however leave school with an ‘O’ level in technical drawing and motor engineering.
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
regularly served up over 60 covers. It was all about steaks, seafood and ambiance, which were all abundant at the Island Inn!
Torquay also housed many international language schools, and many households accommodated foreign students, including us. It was not uncommon to have several nationalities from all quarters of the globe lodging with us at anyone time.
Looking back, I can see that in these early years of my life, I learned to cook, engage in the successful marketing of food and beverages (F.M.C.G) businesses, and communicate with people from all over the world!
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
straight from the tin, our relationship didn’t last long.
We hitched it all the way down to Rimini in Italy together, where we finally departed company. I was shocked to find Italians didn’t know what spaghetti bolognas was!
We had run out of money and tensions were high. In the six weeks together we had been mugged, accosted, moved on by gun waving police in Switzerland, dumped at boarders, searched at gunpoint in Italy and had travelled at warp speed down the hard shoulder of a gridlocked motorway, by a crazy Italian.
Our time was done together, so I left Rimini train station, at two in the morning.
With only coins in my pocket, I got myself to the motorway heading North for my first leg of my journey, back to the UK.
My first lift was a small lorry. We couldn’t exchange any conversation, as we could only speak our cultures’ lingo. I was kindly dropped off on the outskirts of Milan. My host had obviously noticed my depravity and handed me all his loose Lira.
I punted this on the first train to Switzerland. I tried the falling asleep trick to overstay my welcome with the intent on getting further up the track, than my ticket allowed. Only to be ejected at the top of some mountain by a very understanding guardsman. He had the knowledge that I had to now get myself down the mountain, back towards Lucerne, my actual ticket stop!
I remember at this point feeling a little dejected and despondent. I was at the top of a mountain, I was cold, hungry, and I only had one Swiss Franc to my name. I knew that there were three francs to the pound, so I went off to the train station shop to see what I could get to eat for thirty pence!
It would seem that luck had been on my side as soon as I left Rimini? My fortunes had changed?
I was collected from outside the train station by an aggregate lorry going down the hill. My driver spoke English and lived in Lucerne. He generously gave me some change and dropped me off at the main station to Paris!
With recently acquired trust in the humankind and some loose change in my pocket for some food, I settled down on a bench in Lucerne station with the hope of showing my passport in the morning for a ticket to Paris?
I was approached by a southern continent looking character. He asked for papier. In which my new founded worldly knowledge and wisdom, I knew this was cigarette papers.
We exchanged papers for tobacco, my first smoke for two days!
Things were going great – all until the police woke us up at 3am. After both being strip searched, it seems my new mate was travelling with huge amounts of American dollars? A stroke of luck for me, after plentiful explanations, to get out us out of the country, I was put on the next train to Paris and my new friend was put on a train to Milan … with his money!
Gare Du Nord closes at 1am; on the street again. The first person I asked ‘do you know where the nearest church is’, (I knew it was possible to crash in churches in Paris for free) replied in perfect English, are you English? I had bumped into an English teacher living in Paris. Kindly, she allowed me to sleep on her floor and sent me on my way with a doorstep cheese sandwich and some English change.
The last legs were equally incredible. On arrival at Calais, I managed to secure a hitch over the channel as lorry driver’s mate. Lorries were allowed to carry an extra as a driver’s mate. My first ever ride in a juggernaut was manned by an Irish man with good humour. His forwarding journey took him through central London.
My sister Melissa lived in Hounslow at the time, so my obvious destination was there. To my amazement, I was dropped off about a mile from Melissa’s lodging. You won’t believe the next bit, there was an AA van parked in the lay bye and I asked for directions to my sister’s street? Jump in mate, I’ll drop you off!
Door to door in four days. A remarkable experience which I carry with me today – the generosity and kindness of folk.
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
within 3 months, they brought me a car (a white ford fiesta), and sent me out on the road.
My job was to visit every free houses inside the M25, and sell them beer. I can do this, so I set off with my shiny new A to Z. The bars included all the universities in London too, so I had plenty on, and the world was my lobster!
Fortunately, one of their beers was quite unique, it was the Godsons Black Horse bitter. A dark beer and 4.8% proof. The chemistry of the beer was good and clean, and it was an easy sell. It was my first encounter working with a true brand, (a classic 3 colour logo design) as consumers found the name that suited them, sometimes it was ‘Godsons Black Horse’, sometimes ‘Godsons’, or ‘Black Horse’ and within other sectors, the crem del la crem, it was named G.B.H for short, and it was good beer too!
The pubs in London were as diverse as you can imagine, from spit and sawdust to bling and brash, and the publicans were challenging at times. I made sure I visited every two weeks so they either gave me an order to get rid of me, and if they liked me, they would try two or three of the beers we made.
Black Horse took off, and we all became Yuppies, along with new words to my vocabulary like ‘yar’! The brothers brought BMW mark 3s and I moved up to a Ford Escort, and the mobile phones back then came with their own suitcase.
I’m still not sure what happened, but soon after the boom came the bust! Maybe it was cash flow, or maybe the cars?
Anyhow, I was out of a job, but not for long as Salisbury Brewery took over the beers and moved production to Salisbury.
Life wasn’t the same. I seemed to be out on a limb on my own. And unfortunately the ‘Black Horse’ was not the same beer, as the chemistry had changed, and it didn’t like to travel, so within a year my trade stopped.
Hey Daryl, there is a job going in a London wine wholesaler, meet in Covent Garden and well go fo a beer!
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
With a connection made, I started selling straight to the London wholesalers and quickly Becks became a commodity, and I was regularly moving two lorries a day. I was lucky to trade with all walks of life, and would revel in bartering on 5 pence a case for half an hour or so. Often I would put a lorry into a wholesaler, and they would swap it for a lorry of something else, and be back on the phone for another one; ‘well only when you have paid for the first one I would say’ … This was contra trading, but I always got paid!
Back then the imported Becks was a great product in its design, another true brand, and a perfect four colour print. The beer arrived with quality packaging, brilliant merchandising, and all importantly Becks was good clean beer at 5%, with no impurities (brewed under the strict German purity law called reinheitsgebot).
Becks beer was in at the start of a revolution, and what became a mass scramble to sign up as many imported beers as possible, in hope that one would become the next big success story.
During that time with Maison Caurette I experienced life in the fast lane; including the frenzies of Beaujolais nouveau days, the pioneering of the Texas Lone Star chain, the introduction of Concha Toro, Siglo Saco, Tequila, and Havana Club rum to name but a few, and even the opening of the first TGI Fridays.
Time to explore …
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
They took me under their wing and found me a place to stay, then dropped me off in the North. Here mainly in the Chang Mia, I spent my days buzzing about on crazy hired motorbikes, and eating out at least five times a day, it was all amazing! I stayed in Thailand for six months.
It took me about a month of absolutely free time, to recollect, reflect and consider. For the first time in my adult lifetime (21), time was mine to enjoy and revel. It seemed there was more to life than work, as I knew it.
With my new hand made Thai suites and empty pockets, I had arrived at my destination, Sydney.
Whilst in Sydney, I stepped onto my first ever dinghy, a Vaucluse Junior. In Sydney at 3pm, a fresh sea breeze arrives. Once I got on, I realised I had to sit, and balance myself on a thin plank of wood, no wire or harness! As a complete novice, that took some practice with lots of UN-planned dunking. As well as falling off, I also used to get off. This thing was scary!
The hardest bit I found to get used to was when you needed to go out on the plank. It was easy to miss! To tack, or gybe, you had to pull yourself in on the jib sheet, and somehow take the plank with you to the other side, only to find it not under you on the next tack. The planks also moved fore and aft, so it was easy for a wave to push it aft before you sat on it!
In Sydney harbour, sailors would often reach in front of the ferry for fun (the ferry with hydrofoils)! It was fun, although a little stupid!
On Sundays, we used to rig up next to the 18-foot Skiffs. These were radical boats, and I wanted a go on one. This unfortunately never happened as I continued on my travels. On that day, I vowed to myself that when I returned to England, I would move to Brighton to continue with my new-found passion for sailing.
As an ambitious young Englishman, securing work was easy in Australia. I sold beer, worked on a movie, decorated a house and worked on a building site. In Melbourne the money earned on the building site was very lucrative, as it cleared the debt on the credit cards from Thailand, financed the trip from Melbourne, via Adelaide to Darwin, brought me a flight to Singapore, a month in Tioman island, the trip up through Malaysia, a couple of weeks in Phi Phi, then back up to Chang Mia again and eventually my fight home to the UK.
I didn’t make it to Brighton. On my return to London I phoned my old boss, and he offered me a job and there I was sucked right back in!
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
I suppose that’s fashion for you!
I was given the fun job of visiting every major city in the UK and Ireland, finding the trendy bars, finding who supplied them, then seeking the company who could deliver the beer and pay for it. Policing was my biggest role as companies would constantly be poaching each other’s territories, undercutting each other to gain market share, sometimes to the detriment of the brand.
There were plenty of scams going on. Did you know you that until fairly recently you didn’t need a licence to sell alcohol if you sold it by the case!
One day, my boss had me sitting outside an empty warehouse in north London. The newbies had all the right paper work, all the reference to set up shop. At first, it was all going smoothly, with regular supplies and regular payments. Commodities were flying out the door. The sting came about a year later. An order for a lorry of champagne came in (60k). All the checks were made, the word on the street was they were all good, everyone was getting paid. Then they were gone!
I had made it at last, I had got there, success as I knew it. Fast cars, lavish lunches, jetting here, jetting there, life in the fast lane! Along with success also bought regular trips to doctors, with copious amounts of Zantac and other wonder potions …
Sol became a phenomenon, I had now explored my home country, and I had also discovered Scotland, and I was regularly selling seven lorries a week (12,250 cases)!
Market share became power for my employer, so he sold out, at the right time it seems. The new helms came with big empty promises, the Mercedes-Benz was the new BMW to them. I saw history repeating itself, and the writing on was the wall and was out of there before the shit his the fan!
So I thought I would have a go …
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
A shiny new Toshiba, with an orange screen. Its power and its limits were unfathomable. With a modem connection to Australia over the telephone line; the World Wide Web, wow, this was mind-blowing! Aussie Dave also introduced me to DOS, Corel Draw, a vector drawing program, and soon after I purchased my very own PC. A brand new 386 with a massive 128 megabyte hard disk, a floppy disk drive and Windows 1, and it even a tape drive to back it all up! I found a computer incredibly useful as it corrected my spelling (I’m dyslexic), it also allowed me to be creative without the use of a writing implement, and I could store and retrieve my work, build a database, and all from within a structured filing system.
With my business plan in hand, I was off …
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
and the flavouring was made from an off the shelf concentrate, (1 pipette per litre) water, and sugar. We devised the name from off the side of a box of King Edward cigars that resided on our bookshelf. The first litre batch was made in our kitchen!
Then off up north to a manufacture I went. I ordered enough bottles, labels and cases for a container load 1750 cases (20 pallets). All going smoothly until it wasn’t. The bottler managed to lose the lable exchange parts (these pass over the bottle on the production line and ad hear labels in specific places), or that’s what they told me? There was no contract back then as it was all done by trust. What I should have done is walk away with a loss of earnings deal, but because I had already sold the lorry I went off and found a labler in London, who could stick the labels on one by one. It was a disaster, as it proved too difficult to get the labels on straight. My first product was doomed from the start, and funny enough there were no repeat orders!
Along with selling Jacksons, one of my clients (Round Imports), thought they could have a go with designing a beer so they did. With my contacts, we slipped it into the marketplace, although it didn’t make much of a dent. Back then it was relatively easy to put a product on the shelves, business was good, anything new was good! Red Eye Lager (The Chief Of Lagers) it was called, was brewed under licence by Charles Wells brewery. Back then these guys brewed Red Stripe, the Jamaican beer brewed in the UK. I’m still not sure if Red Eye was a derivative of Red Stripe, but the chemistry of the beer didn’t seem to be very good!
Round Imports was run by twin brothers Mark and Adrian Round. They were my Oxfordshire distributor for Sol beer, and they normally brought a lorry at a time. They set up shop by importing Grolsh beer and selling to the collages and bars in Oxford. Every week they would collect the empties, then off to Holland to replace there stock. Genius!
So onto the next one …
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
In a nutshell every buyer brought a lorry, and at that time, a £1 a case for me everything was dandy! I remember Adrian leant me his Yellow G60 VW Corrado, and on selling my third lorry that day I found it difficult to keep under the speed limits. Everything was very exciting!
From memory in the run-up to Xmas, I think I sold 130,000 cases in under three months, Merrydown cider, our supplier’s share price went from £1 to £3 overnight, and production and cash flow was a problem, albeit a nice problem, and now I had my very own brand-new yellow corrado, the success was somewhat overwhelming!
During that time, with my PC at hand and my CorelDRAW graphic design skills, (and lots of high resolutions scans), I replicated the bottle artwork, ready for mass production, and we expanded into the off-trade can market, with our very own 440ml TNT cider can.
Our competitor, Diamond White from Taunton cider tried everything to spanner us, from writing to local councils, to getting the Brewery Society to close all the doors in the tied trade (brewery owned), and eventually getting the product banned via the Portland Group.
Since the beginning of my time in the licensed trade began, the industry had changed, and opportunities were ever becoming more difficult. With so many products entering the market, from all over the world, the big boys started to close ranks, with a few new hurdles to overcome like; A listing allowance. This is basically a charge (sometimes a back hander) to stock your product(s), and this amount could be anything from 10k to 100k.
Well, that’s cartels for you …
A spent a couple of years in Oxford living and working with the brothers and to this day when I reminisce, I’m filled with fond memories and warmth, as they looked after me and taught me a lot about life, thank you …
*Source. The Off licence News 1991
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
London who, on the back of the idea, said he can list us as a design consultancy on Ofex stock exchange (a specialised UK-based market for trading shares in smaller, unlisted, and unquoted companies).
We were off. I called them TOC TOC bugs! There were Barnaby, Harlequin & Goliath bugs all travelling along with the bugs’ rug (mouse mat). I sourced production of the casing in Plymouth, the movement in Torquay, and the packaging in Paignton. The clever bits (at that time) was a relay for the cable, so different bugs could be attached and re-attached, so one cable fits all …
Our creative journey was explosive. How can we extrapolate, how can we improve, what else can we do!
With weekly trips to London, patent and trademarks were filed, and for the flotation prospectus we had a managing director, marketing director, and finance director all on board.
We sent out eleven promotional packs, and all eleven wanted to meet us, including Harrods, Virgin Megastores, Comet, Dixon’s Stores Group, and Hamleys, to name just a few.
With two years in, the money never came through. It seemed the guys in the city didn’t actually do anything, and later we found out that the contact was banned from raising money due to fraud. I was wearing too many hats and with all the highs and the lows along the way, by this time I was all burn’t out!
With reflection, I still get goose bumps thinking about the Bug’s product design journey. Looking back at this project it was all absorbing, right from the outset of the idea moment, and right through to the finish when it stopped, including all the trials and tribulation, it was a pure journey of discovery … I here thank Dick for being part of that journey!
Daryl Geary
Top Stirrer
Planet Marmalade – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
Our ‘perfect mix’ is our most popular recipe to date. This bumper set of key ingredients includes a successful first batch with the addition of our secret blend of sugar, spice & all things nice that are ‘good with Google!’
A brand-new batch of marmalade, plus our special ‘good with Google’ mix. This Planet Marmalade blend of ingredients includes the all important SEO package, allowing your position in Google to set.
If you are new to Planet Marmalade and seek to add some zest to your current business, we need to say hi! Let’s spend some time in nature, breathe some fresh air, smell some flowers and have a look over a hill. Here we can collect, mix and stir your passions and create the perfect blend for that perfect batch.
Taking the time to get the basics right, creates a first batch that stores well, ensuring a long sell-by date.
Our ‘perfect mix’ package normally costs £160 per month (depending on the size of your business including the number of products or services) for the first 12 months. Moving forward, your monthly cost will reduce to £40 per month (again depending on the size of your business etc), these costs include your sites’ website maintenance and updates. If you’re happy with the recipe and process, we require three months’ payment as an upfront deposit.
Just let us know and we’ll make a plan!
Planet Marmalade Perfect Mix Package – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
Get Planet Marmalade to collect all the core ingredients, to make your very own first successful batch of marmalade.
A brand-new batch of marmalade! Working together, we will explore your passions and dreams, discovering the perfect list of ingredients to create a successful on and offline business.
To get off on the right footing, we need to meet up and see what’s in the store cupboard. Here we can explore all the options to make sure we start with the right ingredients.
Over time, together, we can go on a journey that collects and adds those ingredients at just the right time, to ensure your very own successful first batch.
Our ‘first batch’ package normally costs £100 per month (depending on the size of your business, including the number of products or services) for the first 12 months. Moving forward, your monthly cost will reduce to £40 per month (again depending on the size of your business etc), these costs include your sites’ website maintenance and updates. If you’re happy with the recipe and process, we require three months’ payment as an upfront deposit.
Planet Marmalade First Batch Package – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
Add some sugar & spice to your current on & off-line business, and let Planet Marmalade get you started on your first batch.
Our ‘getting started’ package is ideal for existing businesses that need some extra zest.
Working with your current branding and website content, or starting fresh, we work with you, your ideas and your passions to create the perfect recipe for a successful on and off-line business.
To get started, we need to meet up and ponder. Let’s go for a walk, take in some air, see some sights and make a plan!
Our ‘getting started’ package normally costs £50 per month (depending on the size of your business, including the number of products or services) for the first 12 months. If you’re happy with these ingredients, we require three months’ payment as an upfront deposit.
Planet Marmalade Getting Started Package – Graphic Design – Website Design – SEO
