Joe Mearns Email & Phone Number

The design, fabrication, assembly and sales of titanium framed bicycles together with the sourcing and packaging of Shilajit from Bhutan. Alongside these retail businesses we still run bespoke trips to the Himalayas and cycling experiences in Catalonia for small groups.

London, England, United Kingdom

Greenrock has evolved due to the pandemic from its original roots in the creative design and management of adventure travel and challenge events, which we had a long and successful history with from The Race Across Europe and Isle of Man Cycling Challenge to many trips in the Himalayas, Andes and Europe.We are now using the decades of experience we have acquired travelling with our bikes, cycling around the world and looking after other groups of cyclists to design and fabricate our own range of titanium framed bicycles, which are now available for sale.Alongside this through our very strong connections with Bhutan, which is one of the few countries we still take groups to, we are also importing the health supplement Shilajit which we are selling through our new Amazon store.

Xiamen, Fujian, China

A company that came about through a gradual evolution from living on board boats for the last 10 years which in turn led to contacts in China and the sourcing of marine related products on an entrepreneurial basis. After joining forces with my then Chinese speaking business partner we set up our own boat building facility in Xiamen, China, where I lived while running the company. We started the company from scratch building not only logo, name and brand, but also fitting out the factory, employing a team of 23 and working in unison with our designer Adam Younger on brand new designs. We specialised in large RIBs from 7.5m to 12m that are very fast and highly suited to commercial, leisure and military use.Our business model bought the best of the west into China from the UK and the likes of High Modulus in New Zealand for structural engineering.A review from the Australian magazine Trade-a-boat for our Firefly can be seen here - http://www.tradeboats.com.au/tradeaboat-reviews/boats/0910/firefly-77m-rib-review/The company was sold in 2010 to a Chinese buyer who I then carried out consultancy work for on the island of Hainan Dao where production was moved to. I then represented the Nordic Star brand at London, Dusseldorf and Amsterdam boat show, helping import the boats from China and designing, setting up and managing the stands and brand promotion later in 2010.

London, United Kingdom

This was a hugely varied and enjoyable job during which our team transformed the events department’s budget from a negligible contribution to just under £1 million in my last financial year. I worked with the Chief Executive of the hospital on a close basis and jointly managed an events team of four full-time staff as well as jointly setting and managing the annual events budget. Prior to my arrival all international challenge events were outsourced – as a team we took them on ourselves. I negotiated with the British Automobile Racing Club to reinvigorate the once-famous Beaujoulais Challenge and involved vineyards in France, wine importers in the UK and motor racing enthusiasts to create a popular and successful annual event which garnered huge national publicity for the charity. I designed, marketed and led international events such as the bi-annual ‘Warsaw–Krakow–Prague Bike Ride’ with the Peper-Harrow Foundation. Within the UK I recruited, organised and supported over 400 runners each year for the London Marathon, and established a popular series of triathlons and duathlons with Marie Curie Cancer Care at Millfield School in Somerset. To increase Great Ormond’s Street Hospital’s profile I targeted the City, universities and schools to nominate us as their ‘Charity of the Year’ which involved negotiating at head office level with Morgan Stanley, Chase Manhattan, Lloyds Insurance and GEC, as well as representing GOSH at RAG events from Cambridge to Aberystwyth. I also created and chaired social events such as the Children’s Art Auction at Philips Auctioneers in New Bond Street, and organised further events at venues from London Zoo to Windsor Race Course. We designed adverts to publicise our events in national magazines such as Men’s Health, Vogue and Marie Claire and I was an occasional spokesperson for GOSH on TV and radio.