Meet the team
Find out a little about our most senior people, what they do and how they can help you.
Jonathan Brod - Partner
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Jonathan has worked in the private equity and small cap corporate finance industry since 1995 and has particular expertise in the leisure, consumer and marketing sectors.
He founded Next Wave Partners in 2002 and has experience of all sides of the investment dynamic: being management, being an advisor and being an investor.
Jonathan works with the board on long term strategy planning and represents the Next Wave fund on the board.
Richard Barton - Managing Director
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Richard joined in 2001 from ORC and prior to this was client side at the Rover Group in a non research role. Promoted to the board at aged just 28, Richard was made Managing Director for London in 2008.
He is a hands on quantitative specialist and he and his team are responsible for setting up and overseeing large, complex and often international tracking studies for some of our biggest media and telecoms clients.
Richard often debriefs the most senior stakeholder clients, summarising data to identify the business critical issues and interpreting findings so that we can provide recommendations. He has particular experience of modelling surveys using conjoint or Brand Price Trade Off to inform NPD, likely uptake, pricing levels and general feasibility across a range of industries. He is a member of the MRS and the MRG.
Charlotte Butterworth - Group Managing Director - Qualitative
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Charlotte joined in 1997 after a stint in political research at MORI. Charlotte oversees all qualitative studies across all SPA Future Thinking’s offices. She has particular expertise in researching kids and youth, understanding women, and media/new media studies.
Charlotte is author of a number of papers which she has presented at conferences and events focused on children’s research. She is often asked to comment on relevant features in the trade and broadsheet press including the Times, Utalk Marketing and Marketing Week.
With a 1st in French and Italian and an MSc in European Social Policy from the London School of Economics, she is also a member of the MRS, MRG and AQR.
Laurence Curtis - Chairman
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Laurence is a Fellow of the Market Research Society and has been in the research industry all his working life.
His role as Chairman is to work with senior management to help define the future strategy for the company and where needed to call on his experience to assist with the implementation of business initiatives.
Suzy Frith - Non Executive Director
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Suzy joined the agency in October 2009 to provide challenge, support & mentoring to senior management.
She co-founded a PC manufacturer in 1982 then started the first UK PR agency to specialise in high tech. Suzy sold the agency to Citigate (now Huntsworth) and stayed on to grow a global network.
Since 2004 she has been a non-exec chair and director for print, marketing, lighting and software companies as well as running a senior management development programme for Cello plc.
David Griffith - Chief Financial Officer
David trained as a Chartered Accountant with Spicer & Oppenheim in London after graduating from Exeter University.
Since leaving public practice he has gained over 20 years of financial and commercial experience at a number of senior financial positions in a wide variety of industries; including Christie’s the auctioneers, Wick Hill Group (software and services), Trader Media Group (publishers of Autotrader), Astucia (traffic technology group) and Conder Environmental plc (AIM listed environmental products and services group).
More recently he has acted as a consultant to several companies including a software developer, an on-line retailer and Munro Market Research which was acquired by SPA Future Thinking in April 2011.
Throughout his career, David has concentrated on working with companies that are experiencing periods of rapid growth or change and helping to frame the environment to maximise their development.
Richard Hepburn - Managing Director
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Richard Hepburn has a broad career in general and commercial management with blue chip domestic and international distribution organisations including IKEA, Early Learning Centre and John Menzies. More recently, Richard was a Development Director within a private equity backed specialist publishing business, OAG Worldwide Limited.
Richard’s main experience has been in B2B and B2C business and strategy development, operational management, process reengineering, marketing/PR and pre/post acquisition planning and execution. Additionally, he has worked closely with IT solutions throughout his career, and, since the late 1990’s, has led a number of commercial web-based B2B initiatives.
Richard holds a BSc (Hons) degree in Engineering and an MBA.
Jo Lockett - Group Chief Operating Officer
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Jo began her career on the creative side of advertising working on photo shoots for magazines. After completing the Chartered Institute of Marketing Diploma in 1994, she moved into marketing for B2B services, particularly the market research industry.
She was Head of Marketing at Martin Hamblin GfK (now GfK NOP) for six years and then spent three years working on business development projects for specialist consultancies before joining in 2004
She was made Marketing Director and appointed to the board in 2006 and then promoted to the role of Chief Operating Officer in 2009 to oversee operations, broader company management, overhead control, marketing and business development. She is a member of the MRS, MRG and CIM.
Jon Priest - Chief Executive Officer
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
With well over 20 years hands on market research experience, Jon worked on the client side (British Gas and HTV) before moving to NOP, then Continental Research and finally Pegram Walters (now part of Synovate) before co founding SPA (as one half of the agency was known) in 1994.
In 2010, he sold SPA to Next Wave Partners and the agency was merged with Future Thinking. Jon was made CEO of the larger company and oversees all offices reporting to the investors and advising on strategic routes for the new company. He is also a media research specialist and a well known figure within the industry and acts as key account contact for some of the longest and most valuable clients the agency has.
He has written numerous papers, appeared as an expert commentator on TV and radio and is often quoted in the press on research matters.
He has a degree in Economics & Sociology from the LSE and is a Full Member of the MRS, MRG, ESOMAR and the Marketing Society.
Andrew Tharme - Managing Director
A member of SPA Future Thinking Holding Board
Andrew is Managing Director of SPA Future Thinking's Oxford office. He was Managing Director of Future Thinking (formerly The Oxford Research Agency), who combined as a result of our merger in September 2010.
Andrew is a major shareholder of SPA Future Thinking having conducted a Management Buy-Out (of The Oxford Research Agency) in April 2008, and having joined the agency in September 2005. Andrew has worked agency-side in the FMCG sector for over 11 years, having held Board level roles previously at MMR and Harris Interactive.
Prior to moving agency-side, Andrew spent 10 years in Market Research, Corporate Analysis and Operational Research positions at Nestle Rowntree and Boots. Academically, Andrew holds a BSC (Hons.) in Mathematics & Statistics.
Andrew is a firm believer that clients should receive everything they need from a research agency to help make them successful – relevant expertise, bespoke (yet proven) research solutions, speed and high value for money. Only in this way can agencies themselves be successful.
