Alison Lambert BVSc MMRS MRCVS

Alison is a well-known and thought provoking speaker.

Following qualification as a veterinary surgeon from Liverpool University (last century!) she entered practice and worked in Small Animal practice for several years prior to leaving to pursue a business career first with Hills Pet Nutrition and then MARS.

As founder and managing Director of Onswitch she and her team are constantly provoking new thoughts and ideas for the animal care professions in their relationships with the consumers who have cared for animals in their lives.

The basis for Alison’s passion for the consumer starts its life in her time in FMCG with MARS. During this time she spent time working to understand the consumer
and why they do what they do.

This apprenticeship in consumer understanding led to the formation of Onswitch which today is at the leading edge of understanding what pet owners do and why they do it!

Central to the work that Onswitch do is the evidence that consumers with pets are behaving less like “clients” and, more and more like “shoppers”. Their decision making is driven by convenience factors and the concept of a loyal and bonded pet owner is less and less likely.

Onswitch are Market Research Society Company partners and members of the Mystery Shoppers Providers Association, and Alison is a member of the Market research society

Alison is a visiting lecturer at Nottingham University Vet School covering customer understanding and sits on the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons communications committee.

She has spoken at WSAVA BSAVA BEVA VPMA BVNA and various other animal health meetings.

Alison is married and has a son Alex, a cat Lestor, a dog Luna and a long suffering Husband, Donald. In any spare time that she has Alison is a huge fan of Man Utd and will talk for hours on this subject.

Wendy Miller-Smith (VN, Cert.Ed, CMS)

Wendy Miller-Smith (VN, Cert.Ed, CMS) is a Qualified Veterinary nurse who has gathered extensive experience through her work in referral practice as well as in the animal care industry and held the position of Head of Department for Animal Care and Veterinary Nursing for a large agricultural college and worked as Education Officer for the BVNA.

Wendy is currently an examiner for the RCVS VN qualification, an examiner for the Animal Nursing Assistant Qualification and tutor for a range of correspondence Animal Care and Veterinary Nursing courses.

She now focuses her extensive experience and expertise on working to improve the reception skills of all veterinary staff within veterinary practice as she sees this as an area heavily overlooked. "That first contact can make or break a client's commitment" says Wendy.

Wendy lives on a small holding in rural South west Scotland with her 2 children Mollie and Izzy along with a multitude of animals including, horses, ducks, hens, dogs, cats, rabbits and pygmy goats.

Her children regularly compete on their ponies across a number of disciplines so she can often be seen trailing around the countryside with the Onswitch horse trailer on tow.

Sarah Foster

Sarah has recently joined Onswitch as our Business Development Manager. She has all manner of bits and pieces of experience ranging from pharmaceutical sales, to recruiting accountants in Central London to managing a restaurant, and a First Class Honours degree in Biology. Sarah got her first taste of the veterinary industry when she started working for one of the veterinary wholesalers, and loved the industry so much, she’s now working hard with us to help improve customer service within it!

Passionate about customer service and pets, she should fit right in!

Home is the Cotswolds, where Sarah lives with husband Charlie and Kit Kat the cat, the prettiest silver tabby in the land! Sarah borrows her parent’s dog Evie for walking with!
 

Kristie Fairbanks

Kristie has recently returned for a second stint with Onswitch, and brings with her over 15 years experience across many aspects of the veterinary industry.

Kristie started out as a trainee vet nurse progressing quickly to become head nurse over 3 sites before moving on to work for a global veterinary chain here in the U.K.  This position moved from nurse to training co-ordinator to practice manager for two practices in the North West and also involved working in and with the USA.

From here Kristie joined Onswitch for a short period before seeing how the pharmaceutical industry worked for a while.. and is now pleased to be back with us!

Having seen the industry from all angles, Kristie has developed a passion for excellent customer service and veterinary care.. provided by efficient, motivated and happy team members.

Home is the South Coast.. with her better half and two children, Mia and William. 
 

Carol Palmer (who gets things done)

Eclectic may be the best word to describe a career which started with the qualifications pot smugly empty. Lessons learned at the University of Life, Faculty of Employment include:

Sales office administration, customer service manager, the sole management of computer cutting equipment for a fashion house (probably less exotic than it sounds), responsibility for the setting and publishing of a number of very respected monthly briefing newsletters for a major publisher, a spell in print, operations manager for a peripheral veterinary publisher plus a bit of event management.

So, a well rounded career background which is ideal for the task of ’organiser and fixer’ at Onswitch!

Home features two lazy dogs, a lazy cat, a lazy partner a regular pub quiz appearance every Sunday night and a challenging allotment.

Kate Laskey

I am the Onswitch Office Manager and I crack the whip (LOL) in our HQ at Grantham.
At home I terrorise Bertie and Archie (the miniature wirehaired dachshunds sharing my photo-opportunity!), sons Will (just out of his teens) and Josh (just about to enter his teens). I am assisted in this by husband Nigel.

My work history is……..different! I was in the RAF stationed in Berlin where I was instrumental in the wall coming down (not). I then worked in the property field for some years but jobs as conveyancing secretary and then PA to a Director both morphed into accounts jobs. I ran the administration and marketing of my husband’s business before joining Alison at Onswitch.

I enjoy the challenge of the different situations which arise in the day to day activities of a vibrant and ever evolving organisation.

Emily Eudall

Emily studied at DeMontfort University for four years and gained two diplomas in Horse and Stable Management. She has worked at several top level competition yards and also spent three years as yard manager of the Civil Service Riding Club at The Royal Mews, Buckingham Palace.
For the last eight years she has worked in the veterinary industry as an Equine Nurse and Equine Receptionist and has a thorough understanding of how important it is to give good customer care.
Emily was born in Stamford, Lincolnshire and now lives in South Witham with her Hubby Ant, daughter Lily and two 3-legged Border Collie's, Jen and Max! She also has 2 horses, 3 ponies, a Dexter cow, a Gloucester old spot pig, 2 calling ducks, lots of chickens and lots of turkeys so it’s fair to say she’s an animal lover! She is thrilled to be part the Onswitch team and is to helping improve the relationship between animal carers and consumers.
 

Andy Tilbury

I was born in Harlow, Essex. I'm a true Essex boy! Lived there for many years and started work as a driver, delivering items all over the UK and Europe. I got involved in the events industry over 10 years ago, before that I was a warehouse manager which involved fixing, painting, building the props as well as loading up and delivering the displays for childrens parties to conferences for over 700 delegates.

I follow Tottenham Hotspur as a football club and try to go and see them when I get the chance. When you see me and Bertha travelling around the country come along and say hello.

Heather Maggs FRSA

Heather Maggs is a specialist strategic business consultant, with many years experience. She has an inspirational approach to life, with high energy levels and versatile people skills. She’s a positive thinker, imaginative, dynamic and highly resourceful around people, which usually means she can gain their commitment and support. Her perceptive and innovative stance helps when encouraging others to see and participate in the bigger picture.

Heather was one of the founding directors of Roundhouse HealthAd leading both an MBO and subsequently the purchase of a rival agency.

Heather is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufacture and Commerce. She originally qualified as a veterinary nurse who, after qualifying from university, sold veterinary pharmaceuticals, primarily for May and Baker.

She then joined a large consumer-advertising agency handling major television accounts, including Scrabble. Anglian Water and Araldite before moving into international pharma advertising, launched with a nine-month spell in Chicago.

Heather lives in Bedford with her partner, a dog and two cats.

Rebecca Davies BVSc MRCVS MBA

Rebecca Davies has never been one for standing still, literally or metaphorically. Looking for another challenge, whilst pregnant with her second child, fully qualified vet Rebecca quit her job for a leading pet food manufacturer, to study for an MBA at Manchester Business School.

Uniquely, Rebecca is now able to bring experience and understanding of the animal care industry from the differing perspectives of commercial manufacturer, business best practice and veterinary science. Her experiences at every sharp end of the pet care business; from running a Cheshire small animal practice with her husband, to launching and promoting global brands, combined with her astute business sense are valuable assets in her role as Business Development Director with Onswitch Ltd.

As Rebecca explains: “As a practising vet, I was already well aware of the increasingly commercial world vets now operate within, and of the growing consumer expectations that they are expected to meet. My MBA gave me the tools to arm enterprising vets with, and in Onswitch Ltd I have a hugely influential and well-respected platform of veterinary business expertise to work from.”

She goes on; “For any business, really understanding the consumers’ needs is the first step to meeting them. We use our unique Customer Experience research programmes to watch how clients choose and use services, we talk to them, listen to them and then use their feedback as the base to build a bespoke business strategy on.”

“In an increasingly competitive marketplace, it’s not enough to provide the services we think our customers want. In my role as a business consultant, I’m able to bring together my learnings in practice and in FMCG manufacturing, my MBA qualifications and my experiences as a parent, pet owner and with my own smallholding, to give a unique insight into each of the situations I’m working with.”
 

Luna

Doing a bit of proof reading!