The team behind Deliciously Ella – Ella and Matthew Mills – have announced that they have bought out all their investors, turning the company back into a family business.
The plant-based brand was founded in 2012 as a recipe website, but its offer now encompasses a range of food products, an app, recipe books, a podcast and a London restaurant.
Writing on Instagram on 1 September, the husband and wife team stated: “Today we bought our investors out of our company, which means that as of a few minutes ago, deliciously ella became a fully owned family company again. It’s an extraordinarily emotional moment for us both. This company is truly our heart and soul – I’ve poured everything I have in to it since starting it nine years ago … It truly is part of the fabric of who we are and our family, so knowing that it’ll be that way again means everything.”
As the company ‘really started to grow’ in 2017, the couple needed financial backing so brought on board some external investors who purchased a ‘small portion’ of the business.
“We’ve been lucky with our investor group, who have supported our desire to stay true to all of our ethics and values, but we knew in our heart of hearts that to truly accomplish what we want over the long term: changing the way that we eat and live, and making health, wellbeing and plant-based eating commonplace, we needed to own the company fully,” says the couple. “It’s undoubtably daunting, raising money from our bank to make it happen comes with a lot of personal risk, but we believe with every fibre of our being that this is the right step for us all.”
