Jonathan Wild

Chancellor:

Frederick Belmont, Jonathan Wild's great uncle, arrived in Bradford in 1907, penniless, jobless and not knowing a word of English.  But he was industrious, ingenious and set on using the skills and knowledge of cookery and retailing he had acquired from working in numerous confectioners and bakeries around Europe.  He soon married a local girl, renounced his Swiss citizenship and in 1919, founded what would become Bettys Tea Rooms.  From these beginnings, an iconic Yorkshire business was born.

Bettys & Taylors of Harrogate now operates a chain of high-class, traditional tea rooms, and is a major tea and coffee merchant.  It is a family business, rooted in Yorkshire but with its eye firmly on the horizon, exporting goods to more than thirty countries.

Jonathan Wild ran this business for more than thirty-five years, living and breathing Bettys;  and, until he stepped down earlier this year, masterminded its heady growth.

But it could all have been quite different.  When he graduated (from Oxford, in modern history), he did not immediately follow his father, Victor, into the family business.  Instead, he became a secondary school teacher.  It wasn't too long, however, before Jonathan followed his destiny:  in 1975, he went to work for his father.  In the mid-seventies, the company employed 350 people and had revenues of £1.6 million.  Jonathan learned the business the hard way, with spells working in every role at the company, from baker to waiter, cook to coffee buyer, to see first-hand how everything worked.  He became managing director in 1985, and chairman and chief executive eleven years later.  He has been innovative, seized opportunities and worked hard without ever losing sight of what made Bettys popular in the first place.  Today, the company he dedicated his life to employs more than 1,200 people and has sales of £103 million.

But such success has not been achieved at the expense of everything else. Jonathan is philosophical and wholeheartedly committed to what is right - both for his staff, and for the wider world, and the business he has developed is rooted in the values of responsibility.  It has won the Queen's Award for Enterprise for Sustainable Development - not once, but twice - and supports local communities, working closely with famers and small-holders from whom they source some 10 million kilos of tea and coffee each year.

In 2009, Jonathan and his family business moved from planting trees to saving them by launching the Yorkshire Rainforest Project to help save an area of rainforest the size of Yorkshire.  Also that year, he teamed up with the University's Professor Piers Forster, a leading climate change scientist, to help small non-government organisations find business partners who will also provide volunteers and 'trade' with rainforest communities.  The charity, United Bank of Carbon, has already secured millions in funding, and with Jonathan's steady hand at the helm, has a bright future.

Two of the secrets to Jonathan's success are his enthusiasm and his eagerness to learn about new things.  As one friend said: 'His passion and drive is inspirational. He inspires everyone he meets to do their best.'

Chancellor, I am delighted to present to you for the degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa, Jonathan Wild.