Roger Wade

Wade was born in south London. He has said in an interview that he spent several years of his early childhood in Malaysia before returning with his mother to south London, where he grew up on a council estate; after failing his school exams he studied a university subject he did not want to study, and after university he was sacked from his first three jobs.⁠[1][2][2][2][2]

He has said that at the age of 22 he was at a crossroads; his last job had been in the United States, and he began importing American sportswear and sending it back to friends in Britain, later selling it from a market stall.⁠[2][2][2]

In 1989 Wade founded the streetwear brand Boxfresh together with several designers. He has described Boxfresh as Britain’s first streetwear brand, and said the start-up capital came from a government loan guarantee scheme of about £100,000, while his local council sent him on an entrepreneurship course at London Business School and provided subsidised office and warehouse space.⁠[3][2][2][2]

He has said the first five years were very hard, that he borrowed his parents’ savings and lost them, and only later repaid them in full; Boxfresh eventually grew into a business with a turnover of about £20 million, split evenly between wholesale and retail, with more than 1,000 accounts in about 12 countries (all according to his own account in the interview).⁠[2][2][2][2][2][2]

Wade has said the idea behind Boxfresh was to be the complete antithesis of designer wear, with products meant to be accessible.⁠[1]

In 2005 Pentland Brands acquired Boxfresh from Wade. He has said in an interview that after the sale he worked as a brand director at Pentland for a couple of years, and admitted that, seeking security at the time, he accepted a valuation he perhaps should not have.⁠[3][2][2][2]

On April 27, 2010, Wade became a director of the newly formed BOXPARK LTD. In 2011 BOXPARK Shoreditch, built from recycled shipping containers, opened in London and was billed as the world’s first pop-up mall. He has said that at the time he foresaw the decline of the high street and wanted to recreate a modern high street with small independent stores.⁠[4][2][1][1][1]

BOXPARK opened new sites in Croydon in 2016 and Wembley in 2018, both focused on food. The Wembley site, next to Wembley Stadium, covered 20,000 square feet and was then the largest, with 23 food outlets housed in recycled shipping containers; Wade also brought in Michelin-starred chef Rohit Ghai to run a restaurant there.⁠[5][1][1][1][1]

Wade has said BOXPARK gives street-food vendors their first permanent site, financing their kitchens, sorting suppliers and negotiating bulk deals on their behalf; he has also said the only certain thing in his business plan is that the plan will change.⁠[1][1]

In September 2021 Wade sold his majority stake in BOXPARK to LDC, a mid-market private equity firm that is part of Lloyds Banking Group. LDC backed the management team of Wade, Simon Champion and Ben McLaughlin; existing non-executive director John Leslie became non-executive chairman, and Charles Dunstone exited. At the time BOXPARK had three sites, was on track for revenues of more than £18 million in the year to April 2022, and planned to launch a new concept, BoxHall, in Bristol the following year.⁠[5][6][7][7][7]

Wade said that after a difficult 18 months for the sector, the new partnership would allow the company to accelerate the rollout of new sites in London and in major cities such as Bristol and Manchester.⁠[7]

At the end of May 2022, after ten years as chief executive of BOXPARK, Wade stepped down and handed over to managing director Simon Champion and chief operating officer Ben McLaughlin, remaining with the company as brand consultant and non-executive director.⁠[5][5]

On December 14, 2024, The Venture Room released a full-length interview with Wade. In it he described the sale of BOXPARK as a sale “to Lloyd’s bank,” and said there are only three reasons to be in business: for one’s ego, to sell the business, or to hand it on to one’s family, employees or a charitable trust; he said his 15 years running Boxfresh were about proving himself, while BOXPARK was built to be sold.⁠[2][2][2][2][2][2]

He also spoke of a sense of emptiness after selling BOXPARK, and said he now hopes to give back to the entrepreneurial community through his venture capital fund and “leave this world a little bit better than I found it.”⁠[2][2][2]

On March 5, 2026, Wade resigned as a director of BOXPARK LTD, ending a directorship he had held since 2010.⁠[4][4]

As of October 2026, Wade is chairman of BoxFund. BoxFund is his family office; it invests only its own capital, manages no external money and works to no fund cycle, focusing on UK consumer brands in food and drink, health and wellness, lifestyle and homeware, and sustainability; its portfolio includes Boxpark, Dicky Deans, Nuud and BoxKitchen.⁠[8][9][9][9][9][9][9][10][10][10][10]

“Think about the reason you’re in business and ask yourself those hard questions.” Wade said that if a founder tells him they started a business to control their own destiny, he does not want to hear that pitch; he prefers a frank answer: to make money, or to hand the business on (at 03:04 in the video).⁠[2][2]

“In the early days, try to borrow money rather than give away equity.” He considers early equity expensive, and said government-backed loans, innovation grants and similar support still exist, offering many options beyond venture capital (at 09:33–09:50 in the video).⁠[2][2]

“The best lessons in life come from your failures, and you want to have your failures when they’re small.” Having started from a market stall, he warned against believing in the formula that raising venture capital equals success (at 13:28 in the video).⁠[2][2]

“The best time to set up in business is when you’re young.” He said that when you are young and have nothing, you are not afraid of losing it, whereas a family brings many more worries (at 16:03 in the video).⁠[2][2]

BoxFund: Official website: https://www.boxfund.co.uk/ (opens in a new window).⁠[8]

BOXPARK: Official website: https://www.boxpark.co.uk/ (opens in a new window).⁠[10]