Who we are
Narrative Industries is a specialist digital consultancy for charities, CICs and purpose-led organisations, founded in 2010.
When we launched Narrative in 2010, each founder already had 15 years of experience across design, development and digital strategy. For the next 15 years we built platforms and advised organisations where performance really mattered: we doubled online revenue for brands through conversion rate optimisation, and streamlined businesses through integration and automation.
Our clients ranged from UNHCR, Amnesty International, Save the Children and the BBC to WMUK, BookTastic CIC and Safe Space Group, alongside purpose-led businesses in cleantech and independent news.
In 2025, our 15th year, we made a deliberate choice: apply that commercial-grade experience where it has disproportionate impact. Funding is under pressure, demand for services is rising, and digital has never mattered more.
Charities deserve the same rigour as any ambitious business: strategy before tactics, systems that reduce friction, and platforms that support teams instead of draining them.
[Founder bios to add: photo, name, role, two lines each, LinkedIn links. Alec East, Founder & Digital Strategist, plus co-founder. These bios become the author entities for Our Thinking posts.]
ALEC EAST
Founder & Digital Strategist
Alec has been making digital things people actually use for over 30 years, starting-out with CD-ROMs for the Formula 1 Racing Authority, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, then hand-rolling his first website in 1996 for Marc Almond, screen graphics for feature films that James Bond pointed at, leading web design at Getty Images, working with startups on monetising user-generated content before MySpace, YouTube or Facebook existed, & deisgning the protoype UI for the YouView set-to box. His work has picked a few awards & been published in industry books & magazines.
in 2010, He co-founded Narrative Industries, bringing his experience of private-sector competitiveness & creative solutions to charities and purpose-led organisations. It turns out the same thinking that adds £1m to a fashion brand’s revenue can double the number of cancer patients getting access to the right information, and the second one feels considerably nicer.
CHRIS SMITH
Founder & Digital Strategist
Originally from a software development background, Chris worked on complex systems in the 1990s and early 2000s, picking up a patent along the way. He then transitioned to managing operations, then digital departments, before moving into digital strategy over a decade ago.
Chris has worked with major commercial UK brands, including Vauxhall and Big Yellow Storage, and increasingly with charities and non-profits, such as UNHCR, Coram and WMUK, to help them make more effective use of digital technologies, as well as ensuring that their online presence is effective. Chris has a particular interest in Conversion Rate Optimisation – making user journeys frictionless and a joy to use.
Digital done right, for organisations doing good. We build capability, confidence and momentum rather than quick wins and surface fixes. And we tell you the truth, even when it’s not what you hoped to hear.
