Sahar Hashemi

Sahar Hashemi OBE doesn’t just talk about change—she makes it happen. She transformed the UK from a nation of tea drinkers to coffee lovers when she co-founded Coffee Republic, the country’s first US-style coffee chain, and shifted consumer habits again with Skinny Candy, bringing sugar-free treats into the mainstream. 

Now, with Buy Women Built, she has built not just a brand, but a movement that is redefining the visibility and commercial power of female-founded businesses—turning a single tweet she saw during the pandemic into a movement of over 2,000 brands generating more than £2.5 billion in turnover.  

Sahar believes the entrepreneurial spirit isn’t just for startups—it’s what drives momentum, innovation, and action. But in large organizations, that energy gets buried under layers of process, hesitation, and the false comfort of certainty.  Too often, structures, processes, and habits built for a different era remain, even as customers, competitors, and industries evolve.  The result?  Ways of thinking and working that no longer match the speed of the world outside.  

Sahar Hashemi knows how to ignite entrepreneurial energy—because she’s done it again and again. She has turned ideas from scratch into brands that disrupt industries and shift consumer behaviour.

Her pioneering book, Anyone Can Do It, was the first to strip away the myths of entrepreneurship and reveal its messy, real-world reality, inspiring thousands of entrepreneurs worldwide. It became the UK’s second highest-selling book on entrepreneurship.  Her insights into how bureaucracy, perfectionism, and the need for certainty kill momentum led to Start-Up Forever, a Financial Times Book of the Month, and a playbook for leaders to keep the startup spark alive—before it gets buried.

With a powerful mix of storytelling and real-world experience, she connects with audiences to reignite entrepreneurial energy and break through inertia—rekindling the deep connection to customers that fuels innovation and growth.

Sahar doesn’t give audiences theory. She reconnects them to what they already have—the energy, creativity, and courage buried under old habits, process, and fear. Through powerful storytelling and real-world experience, she reignites the urgency to move, the boldness to act, and the deep connection to customers that fuels innovation and impact.