Over 25 years of the Hive

In the beginning…

When Tom founded Fat Beehive in 1997, he had a simple aim: to provide well-designed, accessible and easy-to-use websites for organisations doing social good. Our first client, Cafédirect, was at the forefront of the fair trade movement, supporting small-scale coffee growers and ensuring a fair wage for local communities.

We’ve stayed true to Tom’s original vision and have now worked with hundreds of organisations dedicated to improving people’s lives, from household names to niche charities doing great work. Heard of the End Violence Against Women coalition? If not, check them out!

Early days

First off we built our own bespoke Content Management System (Beekeeper), as there wasn’t a suitable CMS for the not-for-profit sector in existence. However, times have changed and we now specialise in building WordPress and Drupal charity websites. Open-source has become a cornerstone of our development philosophy, and we’re proud members of the worldwide development community for these CMSs.

Although the technology has changed, our commitment to social good has never wavered.

Evolution of the agency

The last few years have seen really exciting changes at Fat Beehive. We’ve refined our services, expanded our staff in key areas and rebranded. We still “do web stuff”, but it’s more delightful and ethical than ever. We continue to go from strength to strength, with some incredible sites and brands going live, including ours – a process that has given us even more empathy for what our clients face. Charity web design has never been so much fun!

Recent highlights include getting shortlisted for the Best Digital Campaign at The Drum Social Purpose Awards for our Tommy’s pre-pregnancy web app and being recognised as one of the UK’s top 10 employers.

See what jobs are currently open at Fat Beehive, including our benefits.